When the Treasury asks for its annual 4% or 5% reduction in budgets, the Foreign Office has quietly satisfied this by selling our best overseas buildings for ambassadors and consular officials over the past 15 years or so.
In San Francisco, we sold an exquisite property overlooking the Golden Gate bridge, which was the finest building of its type in the city. We bought a replacement that was unsuitable for disabled people and could not host Tony Blair’s visit as prime minister. Instead, we had to borrow secretary of state Warren Christopher’s house. How embarrassing. But it made the requisite figure in the book.
It was worse in New York, where we bought, sold and leased a number of buildings – mostly inappropriate – but one included Churchill’s old flat, which the Americans loved. So buying a new building for $16m (£12m) seems sensible but mad (Report, 27 March). The business of America is largely in Silicon Valley, whose GDP ranks ninth in the world, with the UK sixth. It is San Francisco and Seattle that need the FCO’s attention, not a palace in New York.
Derek Wyatt
(Former MP), London
• How appropriate – “the ultimate global address” for a UK civil servant to oversee the signing of trade deals in a post-Brexit world. He will represent a country that is bankrupting itself and drifting into isolation and obscurity. Trump will no doubt be rushing to United Nations Plaza to sign deals.
Anne Anderton
Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire
• Following the Grenfell tragedy, it is shameful that funding was not provided to ensure the safety of tower blocks. Nearly two years on, many have no sprinkler systems, or still have combustible cladding. Meanwhile, developers and councils contest responsibility to rectify the situation. Perhaps the UK’s trade commissioner for North America could forgo his $16m penthouse and free up some cash.
Pattie Friend
Isleworth, London
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