Wednesday, May 2, 2012

The cost of British and Irish diplomacy in the EU

Last year diplomacy the administration cost of diplomatic representation in 26 other EU Member States cost the British Government over €141 million last year while the Irish Government spent €19 million on our diplomatic enterprise in the Member States.  That excludes the €3.3 million Ireland spent on the permanent representation to the EU in Brussels.

British diplomacy in Ireland costs HM Government €2.7 million while Irish diplomacy in the United Kingdom cost €4.5 million, including almost €1.25 million spent on offices in Armagh and Belfast.  Ireland’s diplomatic spend in the UK is broadly similar to the British diplomatic spend in Cyprus.

Six years ago Ireland spent over €7 million in Great Britain maintaining offices in Cardiff and Edinburgh as well as the embassy and visa office in London.

There are just five jurisdictions in the world where Britain does not have a diplomatic presence.  Ireland currently has 56 embassies, 10 consulates and 7 multilateral missions with entities such as the European Union, United Nations, Council of Europe and the OECD.  Several ambassadors carry accreditation to third countries on a non-resident basis, such as The Holy See.

The following is a comparison of actual 2011 costs of maintaining these embassies:

 

COUNTRY

UK – €

IE – €

AUSTRIA

  6,810,326

   655,547

BELGIUM

  8,428,181

   799,662

BULGARIA

  3,469,899

   360,831

CYPRUS

  4,544,052

   366,537

CZECH REP

  4,624,478

   570,991

DENMARK

  5,509,086

   393,102

ESTONIA

  2,328,663

   378,515

FINLAND

  4,789,540

   508,919

FRANCE

12,797,155

1,647,082

GERMANY

18,979,903

    926,903

GREECE

  7,698,253

    471,858

HUNGARY

  5,339,509

    486,420

IRELAND

  2,767,729

ITALY

-1,651,964

1,146,284

LATVIA

  1,812,955

   183,604

LITHUANIA

  1,812,955

   414,957

LUXEMBOURG

  1,677,422

   387,042

MALTA

  2,809,973

   324,249

THE NETHERLANDS

  5,755,805

   652,113

POLAND

  8,050,601

  737,398

PORTUGAL

  4,751,460

  427,883

ROMANIA

  4,153,139

  472,071

SLOVAKIA

  2,102,514

  356,754

SLOVENIA

  1,946,207

  400,385

SPAIN

14,553,068

  971,078

SWEDEN

  5,502,374

  616,346

UK

4,502,655

TOTAL

€141,263,284

€19,159,126

[The negative figure showing for the British embassy in Italy is due to income from other Government Departments and impairment (property revaluation) costs.]

Ireland’s diplomatic footprint in North America costs €4.4 million; BRICS €4.2 million, Latin America €1.3 million, The Middle East €2.5 million, Asia-Pac €4.9 million and the United Nations €3.2 million.

The are also diplomatic offices and embassies that support the Irish Aid programme and in other locations, such as Norway, Turkey, Nigeria and Switzerland.

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