Deputy Foreign Secretary
The Deputy Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, also known as the Deputy Foreign Secretary was a minister of state position in the Government of the United Kingdom deputised to the Foreign Secretary and whose responsibility was to deputise for and represent the Foreign Secretary in the House of Commons. It was created for Andrew Mitchell, who was the only holder of the office.
History
In 1947, the Labour government of Clement Attlee appointed Frank Pakenham, a member of the House of Lords, to the unofficial title of Deputy Foreign Secretary, with responsibility for the British-occupied zones in post-war Germany.In the years following, senior Foreign Office ministers were often considered as de facto deputy to the Foreign Secretary, and occasionally granted the right to attend Cabinet, but without formally or informally holding the title of Deputy Foreign Secretary - for example, Sayeeda Warsi during the Cameron–Clegg coalition.
In November 2023, former Prime Minister David Cameron was appointed Foreign Secretary and a life peer in the House of Lords as part of the November 2023 British cabinet reshuffle by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, with Andrew Mitchell, a Minister of State in the Foreign Office, nominated to act as Cameron's representative in the House of Commons and granted the right to attend cabinet.
In April 2024, during a mini-reshuffle by Sunak, following criticism that Cameron, as a member of the House of Lords, could not be scrutinised in the House of Commons to the same extent as other ministers, Mitchell was formally given the title of Deputy Foreign Secretary, the first time the post had been officially granted, while continuing to deputise for Cameron in the House of Commons and attend cabinet, as he had since Cameron's appointment.
Following the 2024 general election, the post of Foreign Secretary reverted to being held by a member of the House of Commons in the Starmer ministry, leaving the formal post of Deputy Foreign Secretary vacant.