Policy paper

Consular and Crisis Strategy 2022

Published 25 August 2022

Introduction by Jennifer Anderson, Director for Consular Services

The delivery of consular services to British nationals abroad, including during periods of crisis, is a vital public service and one of the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office’s top priorities.

Since the early 2000s, the FCDO has professionalised and improved the delivery of its consular services. The vision for that has been laid out in a series of strategies. Global standards and policies have been set, delivered by a cadre of trained consular and crisis response staff; feedback and performance metrics have been developed; our crisis management capabilities have been expanded and regularly tested, and we have introduced new models of delivery, including a global Consular Contact Centre and Emergency Travel Document Centre.

This sixth, updated, strategy follows a period of unprecedented change and challenge. The global COVID-19 pandemic has affected all areas of delivery. We have been through a series of major crisis operations including the 2020 global COVID-19 repatriation programme, the largest peacetime military evacuation since World War 2 from Afghanistan, and latterly the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The UK’s withdrawal from the European Union has changed how British people travel and live in Europe. The number of requests for information and assistance from the British public has varied significantly, alongside the nature of the support required.

This period of change, disruption and crisis has tested our provision of consular services, which we deliver 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Staff around the world have demonstrated great personal commitment, ensuring continuity of consular services even under stringent local lockdowns. Resilient and agile resourcing which can rapidly be scaled up to support unprecedented spikes in demands is now an integral part of our consular model. Given the high public profile of our consular work, it is right that we face rigorous scrutiny. 

Since 2020 there have been 2 Foreign Affairs Committee inquiries alongside other internal and external reviews into the delivery of key elements of our consular services such as deaths abroad and complex overseas detentions. The merger of the former Foreign & Commonwealth Office and Department for International Development has created opportunities for even closer collaboration on crisis management while reinforcing the importance of organisation-wide training and crisis awareness.

While updating our strategy, we have also refreshed and updated our Support for British Nationals Abroad pages on GOV.UK to be clear on the types of support that we can provide, as well as the limits to that help. Our revised Consular Charter sets out what British people can expect from us and what we ask from them in return.

This strategy assumes a rapid return to pre-pandemic levels of travel alongside a continued high level of demand for the full range of consular services including in periods of crisis. It is focussed on sustaining and improving our digital and in person 24/7 services, tailored consular assistance focused on the vulnerable, the prevention of incidents requiring consular assistance and continued strengthening of our crisis planning and response.

Delivering this strategy is in the hands of our people: our most valuable asset. Resolving consular cases requires expertise from a wide range of staff. Our Consular Contact Centre, global service centres, local consular teams in country and specialist policy teams at the FCDO need to collaborate to get the best outcome. Our network of nearly 900 staff across the UK, in our global centres and in more than 200 embassies, high commissions and consulates around the world brings diversity, local knowledge and expertise.

While this strategy emphasises our commitment to 24/7 accessibility and increasing our online services, we want to balance this with retaining a near global presence of consular staff so that we can offer in person support to those who need it and retain the agility and resilience we need to respond when crisis hits. We recognise how demanding consular work is on our teams – we will continue to provide a dedicated Wellbeing Support Programme to our officers, who deal with some of the most distressing situations that staff in the FCDO must face.

Jennifer Anderson, Director for Consular Services

Overview of the support FCDO Consular Services provides annually

In any given year, we support around 20,000 to 25,000 British nationals and their families, including approximately:

• 6,800 detained or arrested abroad
• 4,500 who die abroad
• 4,000 who are hospitalised
• 1,600 who are victims of crime
• 5,000 who need welfare support

24/7 services

We will be available to British people who need our help at any time of day or night.

In today’s increasingly digital world, we recognise how important it is for British people to be able to access our consular services 24/7. Our global consular network is set up so that no matter where someone currently is, or what time it is, we will always be available to provide initial consular support when they contact us.

When our previous strategy was published in 2016, individual consular sections in British missions abroad were the primary means of providing consular services. We committed to be available to receive calls 24 hours a day, anticipating our Consular Contact Centre moving to 24/7 operations in 2017 and being able to handle all consular enquiries to our overseas embassies, high commissions and consulates and to Consular Directorate in the UK. This included providing an emergency escalation route to the FCDO’s Global Response Centre for those who were vulnerable and needed support when country offices were closed.

Professional first response at any time of day or night

In 2022, our global Consular Contact Centre, made up entirely of consular staff, is well established as the first point of contact for British nationals abroad who reach out to the FCDO for support. The service offers 24/7 first-response consular advice and support, whenever someone contacts us by phone, web form or social media.

We provide the same level of first response day and night and no matter the channel that has been used to reach us. Most of the enquiries we receive are now resolved by staff at the Consular Contact Centre. Our staff can guide people to, or explain, our extensive publicly available information, which we update regularly. We are also introducing the automatic transfer of calls for non-consular callers on visa and passport enquiries to the correct UK government department. This frees up our consular staff in our embassies, high commissions and consulates from handling general enquiries and allows them to focus on helping those who are vulnerable and who most need our help.

We are also continuously reviewing our processes to provide a better 24/7 service for those who require further consular assistance, for example changing how the Consular Contact Centre can escalate cases more efficiently to consular teams in the UK and overseas during working hours, and to our experienced consular case officers in the Global Response Centre out of hours.

Not having your passport while abroad can be distressing

Our largest transaction service is the provision of Emergency Travel Documents. We usually receive around 36,000 applications a year for Emergency Travel Documents from British people who are abroad and need to travel urgently but whose passports have been lost or stolen or otherwise not available. 

To ensure a more consistent and reliable service we have set up a global service centre to process online applications for Emergency Travel Documents (ETDs) from British people in every country in the world. The global service centre is open even when consulates are closed. This means British people can apply for an ETD online as soon as they know they need one, and at their convenience, rather than needing to travel to one of our offices to make an application.

Wherever possible we want to offer a courier service so that people do not need to travel to collect their ETD but can have it delivered directly to them. Our intention is to provide more courier options, including a faster premium service, for those who need to guarantee delivery before their date of travel and without needing to come in person to our offices.

A more resilient Consular Contact Centre

The Consular Contact Centre usually handles more than half a million enquiries each year. In the early weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic the volume of calls surged to unprecedented levels, exposing the limitations of our telephony infrastructure and the importance of greater resilience and capacity to scale up our staffing.

From January to September 2020, the number of calls handled each month by the Consular Contact Centre surged, peaking at nearly 60,000 in March 2020. The usual monthly average is around 25,000 to 30,000.

Since then, we have expanded our telephony and contact capabilities by upgrading to a modern cloud contact system; trained a surge team of staff volunteers throughout the FCDO to handle complex consular calls during crises; and contracted an outsourced provider to offer a more resilient triage of enquiries in the event of sudden spikes in demand.

As a result of these improvements, we are now able to answer enquiries and escalate cases fully remotely when necessary, including at scale and in periods of crisis when large numbers of British people need our help at once.

Notarial and document services

We know that it is particularly important for British people living and doing business abroad to have quick and easy access to notarial and document services to prove their eligibility to meet local requirements, for example to get married in Thailand, or import a car in Portugal. These services can now be applied for online with less time spent physically at the consulate. We will extend this to further countries during the strategy cycle.

During this strategy cycle

We will:

• ensure that dedicated consular staff are available 24/7 to provide remote first response for any consular issue anywhere in the world, including for those who find accessing digital services challenging

• refine our processes so that regardless of how someone contacts us initially – by phone, in person, online or by social media – we will escalate cases requiring urgent assistance as soon as they are picked up and ensure consular teams are able to respond consistently

• introduce a new IT system to manage cases, including for crises, integrated with our Consular Contact Centre, so that British people can be confident consular staff will have a more complete view of their contact history from first contact through to the resolution of their case. This means people will not need to repeat their details and their information can be updated by anyone involved in their case

• enable British people to access more of our services online, at a time that suits them and without needing to travel to one of our offices. Our long-standing strategic objective is to continue to embrace new technology to provide modern consular services for British people. We will use GOV.UK to suggest services relevant to the circumstances and location of the person needing support.  Those could be for British people resident abroad to prove their eligibility for local services, or for British travellers who have had their trip disrupted, for example through accidents or crime

• make it easier for British people to access services from local professionals abroad, such as lawyers, translators, medical professionals or funeral directors.  While we are unable to recommend specific professionals, we will provide suggestions based on the location of the British person, and the reasons why they need that professional service

• provide accessible, relevant and timely online guidance to support British people in accessing local services in times of need, including bereavement, hospitalisation, or as a victim of crime, with an option to speak to a member of consular staff at any stage

Assistance

We will provide tailored and empathetic assistance to British people abroad.

Our network of consular staff around the globe has always supported thousands of British people in difficulty abroad. In recent years we have improved and increased the information and services we provide online so that more people can help themselves. But every year, consular officers provide personal, case-specific assistance to British nationals and their families in around 20,000 to 25,000 new cases and a further 8,000 to 10,000 ongoing cases. This assistance includes supporting the bereaved families of British people who have died or been murdered abroad, as well as those reporting parental child abduction or a missing person. We also help British people who have been arrested or detained, those who are in hospital, those who have been raped or sexually assaulted or are the victims of another crime, and those who are facing forced marriage.

Every day our staff assist British people facing some of the most distressing events imaginable, working within the parameters of what is possible and permitted locally, and within our policy as set out in Support for British Nationals Abroad.

During the pandemic, our services came under intense pressure as increasing numbers of British people turned to consular teams as their circumstances changed, local services around the world were stretched or unavailable, and travel restrictions and entry requirements were put in place and rapidly changed.  We had to adapt how we delivered consular assistance, moving to providing more support remotely as countries locked down.

The pandemic tested the agility and resilience of our network, but we continued providing consular support throughout. We will build on lessons learned as we seek to continuously improve the consular assistance we provide globally.

Doing more for those who most need our help and collaborating on complex cases

The focus of our resources and our assistance remains those who most need our help. When British nationals turn to us for help, we will provide support that is consistent globally, delivered by trained staff. This may be from our offices, by our staff travelling to the individual’s location or by staff assisting by phone.

Where we can, we will direct people to other existing support, including online information provided by the FCDO, or where assistance can be better provided by another organisation such as a host government, a travel company or insurance company.

Some cases will become particularly complex and may involve legal or political challenges. We have learnt that an early, integrated, response is invaluable. We train our staff to systematically and regularly assess complex cases; to escalate them to more senior staff without delay so that we can consider what is the most appropriate type of support for that situation and the range of diplomatic tools available. We recognise the value of having a global network where many of our staff are recruited for their local expertise and through their knowledge of local systems and processes can identify issues early, including concerns about human rights and due process.

Some of the longest running cases are where British nationals are in detention abroad. We focus on their welfare and provide support without judgement. In some cases, staff may provide consular support for many years.  Where detainees or their lawyers raise concerns, for example to report torture or mistreatment, we take their allegations seriously. We will consider whether to raise concerns with the local authorities if the detainee wishes us to do so, taking into consideration if this would be potentially harmful to them or other British nationals, and if it is in their best interests. We will also work closely with heads of mission and FCDO political staff, drawing on the insights of our wider diplomatic network as needed.

Access to British prisoners overseas

In many countries during the COVID-19 pandemic we were unable to make prison visits due to local lockdown restrictions. Our staff across the globe worked with host authorities to find new ways to deliver support and maintain contact with approximately 1,900 British nationals in detention. As public health measures are reduced around the globe, we are working with host authorities to ensure consular officers can once again have in-person access to British prisoners abroad.

We recognise that in some of our most distressing cases British people need more specialist support than the FCDO can provide. We work globally with 23 funded UK-based partners (and 1 non-funded partner) who can provide expert help to British nationals, complementing the support that consular officers can provide. This expertise includes, for example, support for detainees, veterans, survivors of rape or sexual assault, those whose family member has been murdered or is missing, or those facing parental child abduction. During the COVID-19 pandemic we further expanded our partnerships. Consular teams at our embassies, high commissions and consulates around the world have built partnerships who can provide support locally. In the coming strategy period we will carry out a needs analysis to identify potential new partnerships to further expand the support available to British people abroad.

Salvation Army Partnership

The Salvation Army’s shelter spaces have supported vulnerable British nationals returning to the UK through providing longer-term support to individuals who otherwise would have been homeless or destitute. This support goes beyond that provided by our partners in Heathrow and Gatwick Travel Care, and the airport chaplaincies at Glasgow, Manchester, Edinburgh and Stansted.

During this strategy cycle

We will:

• continue to do more for people who are vulnerable, focusing our support on those who most need and can benefit from our help. We will do more for those whose cases are the most serious and require the involvement or intervention of the British government. Where people are not vulnerable, we will provide information and advice so that they are able to help themselves

• be professional and empathetic, with the assistance we can provide set out clearly on GOV.UK under Support for British Nationals Abroad. We are committed to ensuring all our staff are confident in explaining to British people how the FCDO can support them, and that we tailor our support to an individual’s needs while showing empathy for an individual’s situation

• drive an integrated approach to complex casework, drawing on expertise, experience and influence across our global network. Teams across the FCDO and other parts of HM Government, in the UK and abroad, will collaborate on complex or sensitive cases, allowing us to draw on a range of experience, expertise and influence to provide the most effective support for British nationals

• develop our staff and increase expertise. We know how important it is to those we help that our staff engage professionally and with empathy and that communications are clear and consistent. We will continue to provide both comprehensive initial training to new staff, and opportunities for the continuous professional development of our many longstanding and experienced staff. We will work with the FCDO’s International Academy on bespoke consular learning and with expert external providers on specific case types including rape and sexual assault and mental health. We will regularly refresh our learning offer as part of reviewing and updating our policies and processes

• continue to expand partnerships locally and globally with organisations who can offer expertise and support to British people beyond our own. We will identify gaps in support for British people, and work to establish new partnerships with UK based or local organisations who are best placed to offer the required expertise and support. We will work closely with them so that the support offered is coordinated

Prevention

We will help British people to stay safer when abroad.

Most British people live or travel abroad without incident and without needing to seek consular assistance. But when an incident happens British people, or their friends or family, often ask whether it could have been prevented, and what might have made a distressing situation more bearable.

Since 2016, prevention has developed into a core element of our consular work, with increased resource and expertise dedicated to it around our network.

Through our prevention work, both in the UK and overseas, we aim to provide information and guidance so that individuals can take responsibility for themselves when they are living and travelling abroad. We identify risks and seek to reduce the number of preventable incidents affecting British people. We look for opportunities to share expertise and build local capability to improve the level of support available for British people when things do go wrong abroad.  We work closely with host authorities, partners in the travel industry and others to support this work.

Travel Advice and public information on GOV.UK

We are committed to keeping our online public information clear, accessible and up to date to help British people make informed decisions about foreign travel. Our aim is to explain the risks and help British people understand the actions they can take to keep themselves safe when abroad.

Travel Advice is our most visible public facing service, receiving 44 million pageviews in pre-pandemic 2019. In 2020, our Travel Advice pages received 111 million pageviews as British people relied on it as a source of up-to-date information when preparing to travel during the pandemic. A team of dedicated FCDO experts work 24/7, 365 days a year to keep FCDO Travel Advice up to date.

We provide Travel Advice for 226 countries and territories. This includes information on entry requirements, the security situation, local laws and customs, health-related information and the risks from natural disasters and terrorism.  We also provide detailed information for specific events, such as major sporting occasions or for pilgrims going on Hajj. The safety of British people is always our key consideration in determining Travel Advice – economic and political considerations do not influence the advice we give.

Our ‘Living in Guides’ contain advice for British people living abroad, including about residency, health and benefits. This includes specific advice for those who qualified as EU residents following the UK’s departure from the European Union.

Using communications campaigns and working with partners to increase the reach of our messages to target audiences

Travel Aware is our established, ‘always on’ campaign that has run since 2014. It encompasses all proactive and reactive communications activity that promotes the FCDO’s Travel Advice to British people who are planning to travel, currently travelling, or living overseas. Key messages include encouraging British nationals to have appropriate travel insurance, to read our Travel Advice for their destination and sign up for alerts.

We work with partners such as airlines, airports, tour operators, cruise lines and travel insurance companies both in the UK and abroad to promote traveller safety at all stages of the service they offer to customers.

Travel Aware

The impact of COVID-19 meant that travelling abroad in the summer of 2021 was different. There were complex rules and procedures around entry requirements and vaccinations certificates which British travellers needed to understand and take action on before travelling or upon arrival in destinations. Our challenge was to provide prompt, up-to-date information for travellers. The Travel Aware campaign ran from June to September and targeted audiences throughout the customer journey with key messages around entry requirements, acquiring appropriate travel insurance and signing up to Travel Advice email alerts.

The campaign was supported by our partners across the travel and tourism sector who helped to multiple our key messages and drive their customers to our Travel Advice pages.

The Travel Aware campaign generated over 3 million pageviews of Travel Advice with research showing that 65% of people who had seen the campaign had taken action, such as checking Travel Advice for their destination.

Working with host authorities and partners to reduce risks, share expertise and build capacity to improve the support British people receive abroad

We focus our Prevention work on the issues that most affect British people travelling and living abroad. Using information from our casework data, as well as customer feedback and our proactive research, we target and prioritise certain issues and areas in the world where we believe taking preventative action can make a difference. We share learning and good practice from our prevention project work with partners and across our global network. We regularly review our work to ensure impact.

Our overseas embassies, high commissions and consulates spot potential risks, which allows us to alert host authorities and work with them to ensure that those living or visiting the country are as safe as possible. For example, in Thailand we influenced local authorities in Chang Mai to introduce stricter rental agreements for motorbike hire that included wearing helmets.

‘Stick With Your Mates’

Our team in the Balearic Islands witnessed an increase in the number of serious falls in the resorts of Magaluf and San Antonio in 2018, Most victims were aged 18 to 30 years, under the influence of alcohol/drugs and alone (71%) when they fell.

The FCDO started a project to change behaviours to encourage young holidaymakers to stay together: ‘Stick with your Mates’. Alongside a targeted communications campaign, the FCDO worked with NGOs, partners, local influencers and police to encourage young people in party resorts to get back safely to their accommodation after a night out. Compared to the previous year there were 61% fewer serious falls and 50% fewer fatal injuries.

Our Prevention work includes sharing expertise and building capacity locally to improve the level of support available for British people or families when things do go wrong overseas. To support British victims in cases of rape and sexual assault abroad we are working with local authorities in a few key locations to improve the assistance they provide, alongside dedicated training for our teams. Our objective is to ensure that British nationals, and other victims, receive high quality, empathetic support and are better able to understand local procedures and the options available to them.

Support for victims of rape and sexual assault

Our Embassy in Peru lobbied the Peruvian authorities to embed a victim-centred approach to working with victims of rape and sexual assault. Following the sharing of UK expertise and highlighting the benefits of a one stop shop for victims of rape and sexual assault, in 2022 the first-ever Sexual Assault Referral Centre was launched in Lima.

We worked with the Sri Lanka Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Attorney General and the High Commission of Sri Lanka in London to eliminate the barriers that were preventing survivors of rape and sexual assault from being able to testify in Sri Lankan court proceedings via video link from the UK. This means that survivors no longer need to either remain in Sri Lanka after the incident or return to the country later for court proceedings, reducing the risk of re-traumatisation. In addition, it increases the likelihood that alleged perpetrators will stand trial, which in turn may act as a deterrent.

During this strategy cycle

We will:

• continue to use data, feedback and insights to identify key risks and trends in our consular assistance work in order to focus our prevention work where it is most needed. We will build expertise in our network to spot emerging trends and consider how best to address them in a holistic way

• provide timely, accurate and relevant information to enable British people to be aware of risks they may face in a particular country. This includes our Travel Advice and other GOV.UK content such as our Living in Guides. We will review Travel Advice content, platform and user experience, to ensure it is fit for purpose, through consultation with the travel and insurance industries and user research.  We will ensure our internal processes are agile and allow for clear and timely Travel Advice updates

• use proactive communications campaigns and work with a range of travel and insurance industry partners to increase the reach of our messages to our target audiences. We will continue to encourage British people travelling abroad to take action by reading our Travel Advice to be aware of local laws and requirements on travellers; to sign up for alerts, for example if there is an urgent change in the local situation; to take out appropriate travel insurance; and be aware of the support the FCDO can (and cannot) provide

• work with local stakeholders to share expertise and build capacity to improve the experience British people have when they need help from another country’s authorities. We will share UK experience and expertise to help improve local capabilities and build capacity in the appropriate authorities overseas. We will look to identify local charities and other organisations who can support British people abroad when things go wrong and specialist help is needed

• work with like-minded countries to lobby for changes to local laws for the benefit of all. Where we see opportunities to share best practice or to introduce requirements to improve safety, we will look to work with partners to help reduce risks. This includes working with tour operators in countries where we have identified trends in British people needing consular assistance to make their customers aware of the specific risks in that location

Crisis

We will maintain a world leading crisis response capability.

Whenever a major incident happens abroad, such as a natural disaster or extreme weather event, a large-scale accident, civil unrest, terrorism or conflict, British people may be affected. The FCDO must be ready to flex and scale our consular response to support those who are directly impacted and need our help.

Our first consular strategy, published in 2004, recognised crisis planning and response as one of our key functions – reflecting that we had learnt important lessons from the 9/11 attacks in 2001, the Bali Bombings of 2002 and the terrorist attacks in Istanbul in 2003. It set out plans for improved contingency planning and emergency response. Every consular strategy since has looked to ensure we are able to both support British people in crisis situations, and to continue to improve how we plan and respond. We have invested in a dedicated crisis centre and built specialist crisis teams, ready to deploy globally.

Since 2020, 3 crises have required responses of extraordinary scale, complexity and duration: the global repatriation of over 38,000 British nationals at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic; the evacuation of over 15,000 British nationals and others from Afghanistan; and the response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. These events underlined the vital role of consular services in the government’s response to international crises, and the need for the FCDO to be ready to respond to incidents of all sizes and complexity. Our commitment to continuous improvement is embedded in staff culture and in crisis systems. We have an extensive programme of lessons learned from the unprecedented crises of the past 2 years, and we will continue to improve our crisis response capabilities, systems and structures, including by capitalising on new technologies.

Planning and preparedness

Since the unprecedented operation to assist British people around the globe to return home at the start of the pandemic, we have built up our contingency planning capabilities. This will enable us to undertake detailed planning work - together with government partners - to mitigate and respond to the most serious risks while also continuing to provide consular services to British people.

During 2021, FCDO crisis preparedness and response included:

• over 5,500 staff across government and the FCDO global network trained
• a coordinated response to multiple crises including: Myanmar coup, Afghanistan crisis, Chad and Ethiopia conflicts
• 12 Rapid Deployment Teams deployed
• over 15,000 people assisted
• over 50,000 calls to our Consular Contact Centres during crises

Although it is impossible to predict when or where the next crisis will strike, we continue to refine how we identify and prepare for overseas crisis risks, ensuring that the FCDO has robust plans in place to respond appropriately.  We constantly update and improve our regular programme of training and exercises, to ensure that the FCDO retains the right skills and capabilities and to enhance the crisis preparedness of our staff.

Following our response to the 2017 Caribbean hurricanes, we increased the number of staff who are crisis trained and ready to respond to surges in demand and have continued to increase capacity. The permanent crisis teams in London are supported by trained volunteer staff from across the UK and overseas network. Overseas, our embassies, high commissions and consulates lead on crisis response and are bolstered by support from the Rapid Deployment Teams, made up of over 200 staff volunteers from across the network.

Improving communication in a crisis

Calls and online enquiries surge significantly in the initial stages of a crisis and we know that effective communication with British people throughout periods of crisis is a vital part of our response. Our 24/7 Services programme has expanded our ability to manage large and rapid increases in incoming requests for advice and assistance, particularly in periods of crisis. The underpinning technology improvements will also make these more resilient and flexible.

Recent crises have reinforced the need for improved ways to be able to establish where British people are during a crisis, and to be able to communicate with them quickly. Our ‘Register Your Presence’ online tool has helped improve our understanding of where British people are located in a crisis and can be used to more easily communicate directly with those affected. We will continue to seek ways to ensure British nationals and their immediate dependents are aware of our advice and how to access our support during a crisis.

Integrated humanitarian response

With the creation of the Foreign Commonwealth & Development Office we have more closely integrated our humanitarian response with our wider crisis response structures, drawing on the respective skills, experience and capabilities of the 2 former organisations. In the first stages of a humanitarian crisis, capabilities such as funding arrangements with trusted partners, deployable humanitarian experts and UK aid supplies can be initiated by the Humanitarian Response Group. This was put to the test during the Ethiopia crisis in 2021, where political, consular and humanitarian elements of the FCDO’s response were closely coordinated.

During this strategy cycle

We will:

• work with colleagues across government, and international partners to ensure that our new contingency planning capability is focussed on agreed priority risks, develop coordinated plans, and draw on the full range of expertise to provide integrated consular, political and humanitarian support when a crisis happens

• improve our end-to-end evacuation process, work with partners across government to ensure a consistent approach to assisted departures, including military-enabled evacuations, in the event it is needed. We will improve our ability to support the rapid departure of British nationals during periods of crisis including through the provision of travel documents and emergency financial assistance

• ensure that FCDO staff, in the UK and overseas, are prepared for their role in a crisis by expanding our crisis training and leadership programme, continuing to build our UK and overseas response cadres and ensuring staff are trained and supported to respond to crises. We will build on benefits of remote teams and the global network which we utilised during the pandemic to reinforce our agile and resilient 24/7 crisis response capability

• ensure that those who need to contact the FCDO during an overseas crisis can do so easily and efficiently, so that help gets where it is needed. We will ensure we can quickly scale up our 24/7 call and enquiry handling, use our new cloud contact system to route crisis calls more effectively, regardless of where in the world they originate, change messaging immediately whether on telephone systems or social media, and ensure that we respond quickly and consistently regardless of the way people chose to contact us

• continue to develop means to communicate more easily with, and directly help, those impacted by a crisis – for example, by further refining use of our ‘Register Your Presence’ online tool and our texting service ‘Notify’

• adopt an integrated case management system to replace our now end of life Crisis Hub software and manage all cases where British nationals seek consular support, including in a crisis. This means people will not need to repeat their details and that all staff working to support them will be able to view actions and update information

• continue to make better use of humanitarian expertise by supporting our network to prepare for humanitarian emergencies and deliver the UK’s initial humanitarian response. Our Humanitarian Response Group will continue to provide humanitarian risk analysis and early warning, and we will integrate  humanitarian response into our planning, training and exercising