The shadow secretary of state for foreign, Commonwealth and development affairs, commonly called the shadow foreign secretary, is a position within the
UK official opposition shadow cabinet that deals mainly with issues surrounding the
Foreign Office
Foreign may refer to:
Government
* Foreign policy, how a country interacts with other countries
* Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in many countries
** Foreign Office, a department of the UK government
** Foreign office and foreign minister
* United ...
. If elected, the person serving as shadow foreign secretary may be designated to serve as the new
foreign secretary.
The current Shadow Secretary of State of foreign, commonwealth and development affairs is
Priti Patel. The shadow secretary (usually with one or more junior shadow ministers) holds the
secretary of state for foreign, commonwealth and development affairs and other FCDO ministers to account in
Parliament
In modern politics and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...
.
Although
DFID and the role of
international development secretary were abolished by the
second Johnson government in 2020, the shadow secretary of state did not have responsibility for development until Lammy was appointed in November 2021. His predecessor,
Lisa Nandy
Lisa Eva Nandy (born 9 August 1979) is a British Labour Party politician serving as Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport since 2024. She has served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for the Wigan constituency since 2010. Nandy previ ...
, served alongside the
shadow secretary of state for international development,
Preet Gill. This however is no longer the case after the
November 2021 British shadow cabinet reshuffle.
List of shadow foreign secretaries
Notes
References
Official Opposition (United Kingdom)
Long stubs with short prose
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