Transforming the network

Through the FCO, the UK has a local presence in 145 countries across the world. The FCO’s 260 posts include:

• 140 embassies and high commissions in capital cities
• 100 consulates and posts located outside capital cities
• ten permanent missions to multilateral organisations (for example the EU and the UN) and
• ten governors in our Overseas Territories.
• We took the opportunity during the review of our strategy to take stock of the role and shape of the FCO’s network. This included extensive discussions with other government departments that use our network for delivering their objectives.

Our main conclusions were as follows:

• the FCO should be committed to maintaining a global network of posts: we make our greatest contribution by operating worldwide, often in difficult and dangerous places.
• The role of an overseas mission has changed: our network now acts as a platform for the whole of Government.
• Our current worldwide staffing distribution does not reflect our new priorities.

In fulfilling our commitment to maintain a flexible global network that serves the whole of Government we will do the following:

• Maintain our ability to operate globally (although some posts may close and new ones open to make sure our network continues to meet demand).
• As well as the FCO’s priority work, our heads of mission and their staff around the world will carry out work for other government departments on all the major issues affecting Britain.
• Partners across Government will continue to put their own resources (staff and money) into our posts to support their operations overseas.

Over the next year, we will change the staffing of our network to reflect priorities and the Government’s future needs. This means there will be an increase in FCO policy staff in Asia, the Middle East and parts of Africa. This increase will be funded by a reduction of our staff in European bilateral posts where the FCO and the UK Government can operate in a variety of ways, including using better communication and IT systems, and working directly with capitals from London and Brussels.

FCO platform for Government

Throughout this report, there are many examples of the close working relationship between the FCO and the rest of Government. Overseas, we provide a platform from which all of the Government can operate, supporting home departments in tackling some of the key issues affecting Britain today.

Counter-terrorism

The Government maintains a diverse and flexible global network dedicated to delivering the UK’s counter-terrorism strategy overseas. Staff from a wide range of government departments work together at our embassies around the world to reduce the risk to the UK from international terrorism.

Staff at our High Commission in Islamabad, for example, are drawn from departments and agencies as varied as the Home Office, the Metropolitan Police, the Department for Transport, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and DfID. All work closely on a range of different activities aimed at countering terrorism and radicalisation, including:

• working with the host government to build the capacity of local law enforcement agencies to tackle terrorism
• helping to improve security at airports and ports
• working to reduce the causes of radicalisation (for example by improving access to education and employment opportunities) and
• supporting the host government in its efforts to disrupt terrorist groups’ access to financing.

Climate change

The FCO, both in London and overseas, built new working relationships, and worked with partners across Government to spread the influence of the Stern Report globally. One example is the work we have done to support regional studies on the economic impacts of climate change – for example in Brazil, Mexico and South-East Asia.

These studies are crucial in helping countries and regions to identify the costs of climate change and assess their policy options. Without these studies, policy-makers would not have enough information to judge the urgency of action on climate change.

Our key partners across Government for this work include DfID, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) and the Office of Climate Change (OCC). The FCO has contributed local contacts and expertise and in most cases co-ordinated the process.

New agreement

In October 2007 the FCO, together with BIA, secured a new agreement with the Chinese Government on the return of Chinese nationals illegally in the UK.

Flexibility

The FCO’s network needs to remain flexible to allow us to react quickly to new demands and changing priorities. We have been looking at ways in which the FCO can work differently from the traditional physical embassy overseas, as the following examples show.

• The ‘unclassified embassy’ project set up in November 2007 is examining how we can manage our communications and knowledge more flexibly overseas by using unclassified IT systems.
• We created an ‘unEmbassy’ in Goma in the Democratic Republic of Congo during the humanitarian crisis in that region. This meant arranging, at short notice, for one member of our staff to work from their hotel room. This is likely to be an increasingly common model in future.
• The roll-out of our upgraded corporate IT system Firecrest will give all FCO staff the ability to work more flexibly than ever before.

The Global Opportunities Fund

The Global Opportunities Fund (GOF) was set up in 2003, its aim being to bring about change and influence at policy level in support of FCO policy priorities.

In 2007/08 the GOF received a total of £66 million funding and oversaw programmes on:

• Afghan counter-narcotics
• climate change and energy counter-terrorism
• drugs and crime
• economic governance
• engaging with the Islamic world
• human rights and migration
• Overseas Territories
• reuniting Europe and
• sustainable development.

The projects included initiatives such as funding community policing in Kenya, improving energy security in the Niger Delta, and promoting the rule of law in China and women’s rights in Afghanistan. The GOF also attempts to secure funding from other sources to make its limited resources go further.

Looking ahead, we want to make our projects more ambitious in scope and to focus our efforts on the FCO’s new policy priorities. To underline the link between our policy goals and its activity, GOF will be renamed the Strategic Programme Fund from 1 April 2008.

The Global Opportunities Fund Annual Report 2006/07 [pdf, 910.5kb, new window) is available on our website.

Overseas Territories (OTs)

The UK’s Overseas Territories (OTs) are: Anguilla, Bermuda, the British Antarctic Territory, the British Indian Ocean Territory, the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, the British Sovereign Base areas on Cyprus, the Falkland Islands, Gibraltar, Montserrat, Pitcairn, St Helena and her Dependencies (Ascension and Tristan da Cunha), South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, and the Turks and Caicos Islands.

The FCO local presence is a vital tool for our work with the Overseas Territories. Working in partnership with them, the FCO has continued to lead the Government’s drive to promote security and good governance in the UK’s OTs.

We have sought to counter threats, strengthen democratic institutions, public services and police forces, and protect the environment (including meeting the challenge of climate change). The FCO has also responded to emergencies and sought to protect the UK from avoidable risk in OTs.

The internal and external security of the OTs continues to be a key focus. In 2007 we worked with the MoD to secure the political and economic well-being of the Falkland Islands 25 years after the Falkland’s conflict.

Work continued in the Caribbean OTs on developing criminal justice and financial regulation strategies through dedicated law enforcement, prison reform and financial services advisers.

In Gibraltar, the 2006 Cordoba agreements between the UK, Gibraltar and Spain are improving the quality of life for citizens on both sides of the border.

Constitutions remain the foundation of good governance in the OTs. A new British Virgin Islands constitution came into force in June 2007 and negotiations over a new constitution for the Falklands began in December 2007.

The FCO has also helped build capacity in the public service through its OT Programme Fund, for example, by working with the National School of Government in the Turks and Caicos Islands. By focusing on regional projects we will help spread best practice, for example on criminal justice issues.

Many of the OTs have rich, but delicate, environments that are vulnerable to climate change. The OT Environment Programme (OTEP) has worked to help the OTs carry through environment charters and support environmental management. The OTEP recently funded a public awareness programme about climate change across the OTs. The FCO has also continued to play a key role in Antarctic forums, including on environmental protection.

In 2007 the FCO provided a Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources system of inspection training packages for officers aboard the HMS Endurance. This improved the UK’s ability to protect the Southern Ocean from illegal fishing.

The FCO’s ability to respond to emergencies and to minimise their impact has also been much in evidence. When Hurricane Dean threatened the Cayman Islands in August 2007, the need to evacuate 11,000 residents and tourists put our disaster management exercises to the test. In December 2007 the FCO also played a key role when a St Helena registered fishing vessel broke down in heavy sea ice in the Ross Sea off the coast of Antarctica.

Also in December 2007, the FCO co-ordinated a delivery of medicines to Tristan da Cunha, the most remote inhabited island in the world, when the population was hit by a virus.

For more information please see the OT section of the FCO website.