Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 23 March 2023 to Question 169226 on Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office: Aviation, on how many occasions that the Secretary of State has travelled overseas on non-scheduled flights with members of (a) the media and (b) business delegations in the travelling party in the period since 1 January 2021.

The FCDO fulfils the requirement, established since 2010, for government departments to publish transparency data in line with the Ministerial Code. The full set of FCDO published transparency returns, which include ministerial overseas travel and senior officials' travel costs (since the department's formation in September 2020), can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/fcdo-ministerial-gifts-hospitality-travel-and-meetings#2020 and https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/fcdo-senior-officials-business-expenses-and-hospitality-april-to-june-2022.

The FCDO published transparency returns include the number of officials who accompanied ministers if non-scheduled travel was used but does not specify members of the media or business delegations. To specify members of the media or business delegations would incur a disproportionate cost to the department.