§ Matthew TaylorTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs how many staff are employed in the Department to work in the communications field, broken down by(a) Government Information and Communication Service staff and (b) other staff; broken down by (i) press officers, (ii) special advisers and (iii) others. [158171]
§ Mr. Mike O'BrienExternal communications is the responsibility of the Press Office in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO). There are 28 staff in the Press Office, comprising of six General Information and Communication Service (GICS) press officers, 11 non-GICS press officers and 11 support staff.
Each of our overseas Posts also has a capacity to deal with local press and communications issues, commensurate with the size of the post and media interest.
There are seven GICS officers working outside the Press Office.
For details of the special advisers employed by the FCO, I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Yeovil (Mr. Laws) on 23 January 2003, Official Report, column 469W.
§ Matthew TaylorTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what the total expenditure on communications for the Department has been in 2003–04, broken down by expenditure on(a) Government Information and Communications Service staff and (b) other staff, broken down by (i) press officers.(ii) special advisers and (iii) others. [158203]
§ Mr. Mike O'BrienExternal communications is the responsibility of the Press Office of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO). We anticipate the staff costs for 2003/04 will be as follows: GICS Press Officers £259,573, non GICS Press Officers £478,780, support1436W staff £331,453, giving a total cost for the year of £1,069,806. There are further UK based, GICS staff, working outside of the Press Office and their cost for 2003–04 is anticipated to be £278,343. The total pay of special advisers for the year 2003–04 is anticipated to be £188,324. Costs comprise salary, employer's national insurance contributions and employers pension contributions.
Our overseas posts have a capacity to deal with local press and communications issues, commensurate with the size of the post and media interest, however these costs could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.
The FCO is also the sponsoring Department for the BBC World Service, whose costs for the 10 months to 31 January 2004 are £177,859,730.