Question to the Department for International Trade:

To ask the Secretary of State for International Trade, what the budget was for the Government's Trade Commissioners in each of the last two years, what the actual spend was in each of those years; what the budget is for the 2018-19 financial year; and how much has been spent in the 2018-19 financial year to date.

The Department delegated budgets to Her Majesty’s Trade Commissioners (HMTCs) for the first time in 2018-19. There are 9 HMTCs across 9 overseas regions. The budgets include the costs of locally engaged staff, non-pay related expenditure and devolved marketing expenditure in each of the regions. The total budget delegated at the beginning of the 2018 financial year was £59.2m and spend at the end of October 2018 was £29.8m.