Supplementary memorandum from the Foreign
and Commonwealth Office
Letter from the Clerk of the Committee
to the Parliamentary Relations and Devolution Department, Foreign
and Commonwealth Office
The Committee decided at its meeting yesterday
evening that, in the light of the FCO response to recommendations
"h" to "j" of its Report on the FCO Annual
Report 200[15],
it will wish to extend the scope of the proposed oral evidence
session with Sir Michael Jay on 4 February to include the FCO's
contingency planning for responding to crises overseas.
It would be very helpful if, in advance of that
session, the Committee could receive a note expanding on the relevant
sections of the Response to its Report. I recognise that this
is very short notice, and while receipt of the note by the evening
of 29 January would be particularly welcome, I am sure the Committee
will be prepared to accept something as late as the afternoon
of 3 February, if necessary.
Clerk of Committee
22 January 2003
Letter from the Parliamentary Relations
and Devolution Department, Foreign and Commonwealth Office to
the Clerk of the Committee
1. In your letter of 22 January, you asked
for a note expanding on the FCO response to recommendations "h"
to "j" of its Report on the FCO Annual Report 2002.
This is set out below.
2. Recommendation h: We recommend that the
Government, in its response to this Report, should set out what
progress has been made in expediting the FCO's response time to
the need to establish new diplomatic premises overseas, with particular
reference to the use of containers.
3. Work is well advanced to ensure that
the FCO has a rapid response capability. On the basis of experience
in Kabul, the FCO has decided to acquire five converted containers
to provide office and sleeping accommodation that can he held
in readiness for immediate deployment wherever there is a need.
We have planned for the worst case where staff going into a country
have to be entirely self- sufficient. Contracts are now in place
for the accommodation, communications equipment and protected
vehicles. By mid February this will enable a small team of diplomatic
staff to become fully operational, at short notice, anywhere in
the world.
4. Recommendation i: We recommend that
consideration be given to establishing a register of former diplomatic
staff prepared to be brought out of retirement for limited periods
to respond to crises such as that in Afghanistan.
5. All staff who are due to retire are invited
to register with the FCO's Outplacement and Career Counselling
Service (PROSPER). Over 1400 retired FCO officers are also members
of the FCO Association (FCOA). Both PROSPER and FCOA maintain
databases containing members' details. We are using these databases
to identify volunteers to help in our response to crises, as was
the case, for example, over Afghanistan.
6. With the aim of making the PROSPER database
as efficient as possible and following the FAC's last Report,
we wrote in mid-December to all retired staff in all grades who
had registered with Prosper and were on our database. In our letter
we asked them to confirm that they were still interested in finding
work in retirement. We wanted to be sure that we understood peoples'
circumstances so that we were in a position to help them if required.
We also asked them to complete and return a modified registration
form, ticking attributes on the list we sent. This is allowing
us more precisely than before to register our retirees' particular
skills, experience and interests and in turn to interrogate our
database more effectively. (Officers listed on our database are
in the great majority under 65 years of age. We normally remove
the names of the over 65s from the list during our periodic updating
exercises.)
7. We sent out 259 letters and asked for
replies within six weeks. After that time we said we would assume
that addressees were no longer interested in work and we would
therefore remove them from our register. To date we have had 145
replies and they are still coming in. Of those replying, some
said they were still actively looking for work and some that their
time was fully occupied and that they preferred to be taken off
the register.
8. Over the Christmas period. Prosper identified
20 retired officers on the database who would be prepared to work
for the Emergency Unit or the Consular Emergency Unit in the event
of a crisis in the Middle Fast over the next weeks. We actually
found 49 retired officers from all grades who had Middle East
and consular experience, had not left the FCO too long ago and
who lived within easy reach of London from which to make the selection.
9. We will be refining the database still
further in the next few weeks when it is fully updated, to include
some new fields eg on location in the UK by county. This will
enable even more efficient interrogation. We are also taking steps
to make quite sure that as officers approach retirement they are
aware of the option of registering with Prosper. The success of
the database depends on officers registering in the first place.
We identified retirees for the Emergency Units very quickly and
are confident we could do so again should the need arise and should
the finance be available for paying them.
10. Recommendation j: We recommend that
the next Annual report should report progress on the development
of systems for responding to international crises and for the
rapid deployment of serving or retired diplomatic, consular or
other personnel in response to changing circumstances worldwide.
11. The FCO has set up three Rapid Deployment
Teams that can be despatched to support Posts when a major consular
crisis occurs. These teams are on 24 hours stand-by in rotation.
12. Each Rapid Deployment Team is led by
a senior Diplomatic Service officer and comprises about eight
staff, equipped with IT and communications. The precise size and
composition of the team will depend on the circumstances, but
the teams include a core of staff with consular experience and
organisational skills. Counsellors and police liaison officers
will reinforce the teams as necessary. When deployed, the teams
will be under the overall charge of the Head of Post. Their role
includes providing help to British nationals affected by the incident,
and to the families of victim; establishing links with the local
authorities and emergency services; and ensuring efficient co-operation
with other British agencies, such as the Police, who may be called
to the scene.
13. The FCO is developing training courses
for all members of the Rapid Deployment Teams. The courses will
cover issues such as dealing with the bereaved, family liaison,
body identification, the work of coroners and pathologists and
organisational matters including the use of dedicated IT and communications
equipment.
14. We have also reviewed how the FCO handles
crises and responds to emerging events. We have concluded that
the current system of out-of-hours Resident Clerks, while it has
served us well, needs to be replaced by a Response Centre operating
24 hours a day, seven days a week. Plans are well advanced to
introduce such a unit over the coming months. This will provide
a permanently alert, single point of entry to the FCO for the
public, media, foreign governments and others. It will ensure
an immediate, coordinated and continuous response to foreign policy
challenges in a global age.
Parliamentary Relations & Devolution Department
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
29 January 2003
15 Foreign Affairs Committee, Twelfth Report of Session
2001-02, Foreign and Commonwealth Office Annual Report 2002,
HC 826, p 5. Back
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