In his written ministerial statement to Parliament on 23 January 2008, the Foreign Secretary, David Miliband announced the conclusion of the FCO’s strategy review and noted that, to shift resources to the new policy goals and sharpen our strategic focus, it was necessary for the FCO to reduce the resources it puts into certain other issues. Notably, the FCO would reduce its involvement in those issues where other government departments in London are better placed to direct the Government’s international priorities, in particular in the areas of sustainable development, science and innovation and drugs and crime.

The Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, also made it clear that our ambassadors and their staff would remain heavily involved in these issues in countries where they are of priority importance to Britain, for example the fight against drugs in Colombia and against crime in Jamaica.

Our overseas posts will continue to act as a platform for all government departments, where they can place their own staff and resources to deliver their priority objectives overseas. Our embassies will continue to offer advice to government departments and their local representatives and act locally on their behalf wherever needed.

The following sections set out what the FCO has achieved in each of these areas in the last year, and summarises the arrangements agreed with other departments for carrying this work forward in future, on the basis set out by the Foreign Secretary, David Miliband.

Working together worldwide: FCO, DfID and the MoD

The FCO works closely with many partners across Government to shape the Government’s policies in London and to deliver them across the world. But in particular we have forged a unique partnership with the DfID and MoD and are working together to tackle conflict, its causes and effects. Each department brings a wealth of knowledge, skills and experiences and their own perspectives and, by working together, we can deliver a more effective response to complex problems than we could by working separately.

Our joint approach to conflict prevention programmes has been maximised through our work with the DfID and MoD, which is funded through the Global and Africa Conflict Prevention Pools, and which we will continue through their successors the Stabilisation Aid Fund and the Conflict Prevention Pool.

• We are jointly responsible for delivery of the Government’s Public Service Agreement (PSA) to reduce the impact of conflict.
• We work increasingly with our partners DfID and MoD through agreed country business planning and strategies, which recognise that security and development are inter-dependent, and we train and exercise together to learn lessons and improve on these plans.
• The FCO, DfID and MoD set up the Stabilisation Unit, which has sent civilian advisers to and helped deliver projects in such countries as Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon and Nepal, in support of our shared objectives.
• In Kabul, DfID has supplied a press officer to the FCO-led British Embassy Press Hub, to brief journalists writing stories on reconstruction and development. The Ambassador regularly updates the Afghan people, on DfID and wider UK Government achievements in the region.
• In Iraq, the FCO, DfID, MoD and the Stabilisation Unit together reviewed how the UK supported the security and justice sector,  This review led to the FCO and DfID setting up a joint project to build capability in the Iraqi Ministry of Interior.

Combined visit

This commitment to joint working was highlighted by the Permanent Secretaries of the FCO, DfID and MoD, who together visited Afghanistan in April 2007 and Iraq in December 2007.

Following the first visit, recommendations from a Stabilisation Unit study of the deployment to Helmand have led to improvements in the UK’s capability in getting civilians into position quickly. The later visit laid the foundations for our current work on a cross-governmental Iraq strategy.

Sharing overseas offices and services

The FCO is committed to sharing premises and services where it makes economic and business sense. We also recognise that when we share premises and facilities with others, we are more likely to co-operate and share information with them. For these reasons, we developed a shared service delivery plan with DfID officials in November 2006. Progress of this delivery plan is monitored every three months.

The plan focuses on those activities where better sharing of services will lead to real improvements in efficiency or in the quality of service provided. The plan also provides a basis for the FCO to achieve value for money from the services we share with DfID.

Drugs and crime

The crime affecting the UK today recognises no borders. A recent UN report assessed that annual income from international organised crime could be as much as $2 trillion (£984 billion) ‘giving it more financial resources than all the military budgets worldwide'. From trafficking in class A drugs and organised immigration crime, money laundering or tobacco smuggling to sex offences against children, all these offences have a foreign dimension.

The FCO’s Drugs and Crime Programme funds projects to improve the capabilities of foreign law enforcement authorities or to tighten up criminal legislation overseas.

For example, in the run-up to Bulgaria and Romania’s joining the EU, the FCO funded an exchange between the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) and the Romanian National Police (RNP). As a result, the RNP has now introduced a pilot model of ‘safer neighbourhoods’ community policing, which incorporates MPS best practice and has helped refine RNP tactics, techniques and approach to reducing organised crime. FCO funding also funded two RNP officers on secondment to an MPS joint intelligence unit for eight months from September 2007 to look at the exploitation and trafficking of Romanian children to the UK.

We have also:

• supported reform of the Jamaica Constabulary Force, to combat organised crime in the UK that has links to Jamaica
• co-funded HM Revenue and Customs’ (HMRC’s) ‘Operation Westbridge’ to intercept drug couriers from Ghana which, with an investment of £250,000, made savings to the UK taxpayer of around £130 million each year and for which Westbridge won the Public Value Award 2007 and
• encouraged increased co-operation between law enforcement officials in the UK and Vietnam, which has helped the Metropolitan Police Service to tackle Vietnamese organised crime in the UK.

The FCO has also co-funded the training of foreign customs and financial investigators, thereby reducing the cost to the UK from VAT fraud, estimated at some £3 to 4 billion (2006/07).

The Home Office, the Serious Organised Crime Agency  and HMRC lead on policy and operational activity to reduce the threat to the UK from international crime. The FCO will remain engaged in these issues in Whitehall and in key countries. Where political influence is called for, our heads of mission will lobby and give diplomatic advice in support of our Whitehall partners, and our posts abroad will provide a base for their staff.

Science and innovation

The FCO’s science and innovation network (SIN) continued to promote the UK as the partner of choice in research and development, generating substantial foreign investment in the UK. For example, work with UKTI in India led to an estimated £100 million worth of investment in the UK in the biotechnology and pharmaceuticals sector.

The UK–Brazil Year of Science and Innovation, led by the FCO’s science and innovation team in Sao Paulo, resulted in five memoranda of understanding being agreed between British and Brazilian scientific institutions. A further four partnerships are currently being negotiated, including an agreement between the UK research councils and their Brazilian counterpart.

With the support of science and innovation teams in China and the USA, Research Councils UK was able to open their first overseas offices. In Beijing this involved over 12 months of negotiation with the Chinese Government.

In Europe the Science and Innovation network (SIN) worked in specific regions, which meant that it was able to deliver an improved service to UK stakeholders, which was focused on better UK access to EU research funding under the Framework 7 Programme [Framework Programme 7 (FP7) is the main financial tool through which the European Union supports scientific research and development activities in Europe].

Science and innovation are top priorities for the Government, and the SIN plays a crucial role in helping to deliver the objectives of many public sector bodies.

Following discussions between the FCO and the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS) it has been agreed that in the future, FCO and DIUS will co-fund the SIN, with DIUS assuming responsibility from the FCO for managing and tasking the network.

Sustainable development and business

• The FCO put its new business and trade union stakeholder plans into action, with an intensified programme of contacts with companies, business organisations and unions feeding into policy-making, especially on EU and cross-cutting global issues.
• The FCO also implemented its first ever strategy on international corporate responsibility, promoting UN work on business and human rights and prioritising partnerships – such as the Global Compact, Kimberley Process and Voluntary Principles – with companies in high-risk sectors working in sensitive parts of the world.
• With other partners across Government, the FCO championed the fight against international corruption, co-ordinating UK action under the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention and at the second meeting of the UN Convention Against Corruption.
• Complementing the work of UKTI, the FCO helped companies in the City of London and elsewhere to address issues as varied as investment regulations in the Middle East, concerns about US claims to extraterritorial jurisdiction and the economic impact of sovereign wealth funds.
• The FCO’s Security Information Service for Business Overseas  – a joint project with the private sector – was significantly upgraded.
• The FCO made progress towards negotiating bilateral investment treaties with other countries and stronger international maritime rules, including continental shelf claims, under the Law of the Sea Convention.
• Under its Sustainable Development Action Plan the FCO worked towards:
  - better international environmental governance
  - environmental democracy and
  - improved management of natural resources such as timber, especially through the UK’s negotiations about sustainable development with key emerging economies.
• Under the new strategic framework, several of these areas of activity are being transferred to BERR, DfID and DEFRA, while others will be handled by different parts of the FCO.