FCO ANNUAL REPORT 2003-04
4. The Foreign Affairs Committee first started conducting
an annual inquiry into the expenditure plans and administration
of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) in 1981.[6]
In 1991, Government departments began publishing annual departmental
reports setting out details of their work during the preceding
year and their expenditure plans for the future. Since that time,
the Foreign Affairs Committee, like many other departmental select
committees, has examined these reports in detail and reported
annually to the House on its findings.
5. The latest FCO Departmental Report was published
on 29 April 2004 and it gives a summary of the whole panoply of
the work done by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in this country
and across the world during the last year.[7]
In his foreword to the report, the Foreign Secretary, Rt Hon Jack
Straw MP, wrote of the, "immensely challenging" twelve
months that British foreign policy and the FCO had faced. He highlighted
developments in Iraq, the European Union (EU), Libya and Afghanistan
in particular, and stated that:
I believe that the FCO's record for the last
year is one of considerable achievement in supporting security,
justice and greater prosperity.[8]
The report goes on to set out details of the Office's
internal administration and the management of its resources, as
well as providing detailed financial information about the department's
activities. It is a very well-presented, attractive and highly
readable report, with many pertinent illustrations and examples.
6. In previous years, this Committee, and its predecessors,
have commented in detail on the report's content, presentation
and format. The FCO has not always agreed with our recommendations
and conclusions, but we believe that our constructive dialogue
has contributed significantly to the evolution and improvement
of the report. We would wish to highlight three areas of the latest
report that have benefited from this Committee's scrutiny: its
title; the cost benefit analysis sections; and the "lessons
learned" boxes.
7. Last year, we noted in our Report on the 2003
Departmental Report that:
it is important to clarify ... that the Foreign
Office's Departmental Report 2003 actually comments upon the period
from May 2002 to early April 2003. The developments and events
it reports on, therefore, primarily took place in the calendar
year 2002. There is a danger, we fear, that the title of the Report,
referring as it does to the year of publication rather than the
period reported on, could unintentionally confuse readers.[9]
We went on to recommend that in future the title
of the FCO's reports should refer to the period upon which they
commented, rather than to the year in which they were published.[10]
The Committee was pleased to see, therefore, that the latest report
was more helpfully titled: Foreign and Commonwealth Office:
Departmental Report 1 April 2003-31 March 2004.
8. In our Report last year, we also welcomed the
introduction of a section entitled 'Cost Benefit' at the end of
nearly every chapter of the 2003 Report. We had long argued that
the Foreign Office had failed to highlight the benefits it brought
to the taxpayer through the expenditure of relatively modest sums,
and we recommended the continuation of this innovation.[11]
We believe that the inclusion of ten such sections in the 2003-04
Report was a very welcome continuation of this innovation.[12]
They provide good examples of projects and schemes that have brought,
or will bring, considerable benefit or savings. For example, the
report estimated that the introduction of a new information technology
(IT) programme for modernising the processing of visa applications
would achieve savings of up to £29 million for the FCO by
2008.[13]
9. The most welcome change in this year's annual
report, though, is a response to a comment that we have made on
a number of occasions: that such publications fail to acknowledge
properly both the successes and failures the Office has encountered
that year. In our Report last year we observed:
A criticism that is sometimes raised in relation
to publications such as departmental annual reports is that they
are too often simply a 'good news story' that fail to present
a balanced, comprehensive view of a department's achievements
and difficulties over the year. This style of presentation is
understandable given any organisation's natural desire to stress
its strengths over its weaknesses. However, it is particularly
important for a Government department to use the opportunity which
an annual report represents to give the most candid assessment
possible of its work to those whom it exists to serve. ... we
recommend that future Reports strive to reflect more accurately
both those areas where the Office has met, or surpassed, its objectives
and those where it had hoped to achieve more.[14]
Given this recommendation, we were very pleased to
see that the 2003-04 report included in most chapters a box entitled
'lessons learned', in a similar way to the 'cost benefit' analyses
described above.[15]
10. The boxes give examples of initiatives, or general
policy areas, that have not gone quite as well as the Office had
hoped. Some are very clear and specific. For example, in the Overseas
Territories (OT) chapter:
Certain OTs (for example Anguilla, the British
Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, Montserrat, and the Turks
and Caicos Islands) are concerned that the UK Government's decision
to extend to them the provisions of the EU Directive on Taxation
of Savings will have an impact on their economies. This is a reminder
of the importance of consulting the OTs before the UK signs up
to domestic or international legislation that may affect them.
This message was repeated by OT ministers at the Consultative
Council meeting in December.[16]
Others are far more general and less helpful to the
lay reader. One 'lesson learned' in the chapter on UK and global
security, for instance, stated that:
Being able to respond rapidly to emerging conflicts
by mobilising resources through using Conflict Prevention Pools
is extremely beneficial.
Is this a statement of fact? Was this not done before?
Is it going to change in the future? Such a 'lesson learned' does
not seem to be particularly helpful either to the lay reader nor
to those within the Office who are supposed to learn from it.
11. On the whole, however, a new era of glasnost
appears to be pervading the annual report and is to be welcomed.
The Foreign Secretary set the tone in his foreword, where he stated
simply that: "We have not achieved everything we set out
to achieve"—a realistic reflection on the work of any
foreign affairs ministry operating in a changing and uncertain
world, but struggling hard to achieve its objectives.[17]
12. We conclude that the FCO Departmental Report
1 April 2003-31 March 2004 is a generally well-presented and
comprehensive document, reflecting the breadth of the Foreign
Office's work and the challenging global situation in which it
operates. We particularly welcome the new 'lessons learned' sections
and recommend that they be developed and made more specific in
future reports in order to present a more realistic picture of
the FCO's activities to the lay reader.
6 Foreign Affairs Committee, Fourth Report of Session
1980-81, Supply Estimates 1981-82, HC 343 Back
7
"British diplomacy records substantial achievement in
year of challenges ", FCO press release, 29 April 2004; Foreign
and Commonwealth Office (FCO), Departmental Report 1 April
2003-31 March 2004, Cm 6213, April 2004 (hereafter referred
to as: Departmental Report 2003-04). This report along
with all FCO publications is available at its website: www.fco.gov.uk. Back
8
Departmental Report 2003-04, pp 4-7 Back
9
Foreign Affairs Committee, Twelfth Report of Session 2002-03,
Foreign and Commonwealth Office Annual Report 2003, HC
859, para 4. This Report along with all other Committee publications
is available at its website: www.parliament.uk/parliamentary_committees/foreign_affairs_committee.cfm Back
10
Ibid. Back
11
Foreign Affairs Committee, Twelfth Report of Session 2002-03,
Foreign and Commonwealth Office Annual Report 2003, HC 859, para
6 Back
12
Departmental Report 2003-04, pp 34, 60, 73, 91, 105, 121,
132, 141, 160 and 172 Back
13
Departmental Report 2003-04, p 132 Back
14
Foreign Affairs Committee, Twelfth Report of Session 2002-03,
Foreign and Commonwealth Office Annual Report 2003, HC 859, paras
8-9. Also see: Foreign Affairs Committee, Twelfth Report of Session
2001-02, Foreign and Commonwealth Office Annual Report 2002, HC
826, para 17. Back
15
Departmental Report 2003-04, pp 33, 59, 73,72, 90, 105,
121, 131, 141, 159 and 173 Back
16
Departmental Report 2003-04, p 140 Back
17
Departmental Report 2003-04, p 4 Back
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