Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 12 November 2020 to Question 113194, what assessment he has made of the Permanent Under-Secretary and Head of the Diplomatic Service's comments to the Foreign Affairs Committee on 10 November 2020 that there will be a smaller number of directors in his Department.

When the two organisations merged, some director roles were duplicated. We have addressed this as part of the new director structure that will have 42 positions overall. The new director structure will fully integrate development and foreign policy objectives and be implemented from December.