Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, pursuant to the Answers of 20 December 2024 and 13 March 2025 to Questions 18362 and 32977 on Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office: Cost Effectiveness, what plans his Department has to make efficiency savings in the (a) 2025-26, (b) 2026-27, (c) 2027-28 and (d) 2028-29 financial years, broken down by (i) savings programme, (ii) savings targets for each programme, (iii) productivity improvements identified, (iv) IT programmes and digital innovation programmes identified and (v) workforce changes.

As agreed with HM Treasury in Phase 1 of Spending Review 2025, The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) will make savings of 2 per cent of total Resource budgets in Financial Year 2025-26 (£26 million). The FCDO plans to achieve this through: the completion of multi-year IT programmes saving £24 million including Osprey and Echo 2, sustainability innovations at global Posts saving £1 million, and productivity improvements in Arm's Length Bodies saving £1 million. There are no workforce changes anticipated from the planned savings and efficiencies in Financial Year 2025-26.

As part of Phase 2 of the Spending Review, all departments are expected to meet savings and efficiencies of more than 5% of their 2025-26 budgets by the end of the period (2028-29). Detail of these proposals will be confirmed once the Spending Review concludes.