Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, how many staff were employed in the Soft Power and External Affairs office within his Department in each year since 2010.
We have not included pre-2018 figures as staff numbers and departmental administration budgets in that period are not directly comparable.
| Number of staff in soft power and external affairs teams | Admin budget of soft power and external affairs teams (£) | Programme budget of soft power and external affairs teams (£)(opening allocations) |
FY 18/19 FCO | 9 | 85,000 | 301,000,000 |
FY 19/20 FCO | 12 | 75,000 | 304,000,000 |
FY 20/21 FCO(until 1 September 2020) | 14 | 79,000 | 309,000,000 |
FY 20/21 FCDO(from 2 September 2020) | 16* | 79,000** | 309,000,000 |
* This includes the FCDO Soft Power Team, and the external affairs function of the FCDO Corporate and Internal Communication Team, which includes former FCO and DfID staff.
** This only covers soft power. There is no separate budget for external affairs, since it is just one function of a team with other responsibilities.