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FOR EUROCRATSEUFCDOFCDOFCDO FCDOFCDO MPAIYour browser does not support the element., Sir Olly Robbins seemed like a relic of an age before Brexit sent the British establishment loopy. Theresa May’s chief negotiator was self-assured, fiercely intelligent and several steps ahead of the politicians, writes Michel Barnier, his counterpart. He sends sweet text messages and invitations to dinner. And few British officials, Mr Barnier gushes, “boast such a deep understanding of domestic security and intelligence issues”.That last quality explains Sir Olly’s imminent return to Whitehall from the private sector, as the permanent under-secretary, or top official, of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (). He is the first non-career diplomat to lead the service in its history after a series of security-related posts in the Treasury, the Home Office and Downing Street.Breaking open the closed shop is intended to be disruptive. David Lammy, the foreign secretary, wants to increase the clout of the within Whitehall after years of marginalisation. (Even its grip on diplomatic posts is eroding: Peter Mandelson, the incoming ambassador to America, and Jonathan Powell, the new national security adviser, are both outsiders.) Someone who understands the wiring of government, Mr Lammy’s logic runs, can restore his department’s influence.The fixation of Sir Keir Starmer’s Downing Street on “delivery” for marginal voters makes the ’s predicament more acute. The summer spending review is a moment of danger: the Treasury will assess all government budgets against how they contribute to domestic policy “missions”. Already, the faces a budget crunch as a pot for capital works, raised by selling old embassies, runs dry by 2027. Old justifications about spreading Britain’s influence in the world may not be enough.Mr Lammy’s answer is to make the the “international delivery arm” of the prime minister’s twin goals of expanding the economy and cutting immigration. Ambassadors will need to put more heft into trade diplomacy (not just occasional cocktail parties) and negotiating deportation deals. He intends to employ the performance-management techniques used under New Labour. A Foreign Office “delivery unit” will monitor embassies’ performance against headline targets.That will doubtless chafe those diplomats who argue that the building of in-country knowledge and influence cannot be quantified like hip operations. Some may not stay: the Treasury has agreed to fund a round of voluntary redundancies. Mr Lammy recently tolds that the department is “top heavy” and its upper ranks will have to “move out and make way” for a new generation. He wants a culture that is less hierarchical and London-weighted and more open to outsiders., it is hoped, will do some of the heavy lifting. Mr Lammy sees two practical use-cases. One, already employed by the American State Department, is to help draft briefings for diplomats. The more ambitious, being pioneered by British spy agencies, is to combine in-house files with open-source data to analyse a counterpart’s vulnerabilities and interests ahead of a negotiation.All this is a more difficult cultural shift for the diplomatic service than might have been expected from Mr Lammy, an ebullient figure who in opposition talked of boosting the morale of a downtrodden service. It will fall to Sir Olly to make it work, but even those who admire his intellect and Stakhanovite work ethic worry about his faults. Mrs May’s doomed Brexit deal was cut in a tiny secretive circle, with key ministers and officials frozen out. “He likes to be in the centre, and in control,” says one who knows him. If only he can charm his colleagues as much as he charmed Mr Barnier.
