The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) has published a multimillion pound 'eDiplomacy' IT strategy, to support a single global online organisation with more flexible working.

The report lays out the technology strategy for the London office and foreign outposts until 2010, and includes plans for increased remote and mobile working for staff across the world.

'The eDiplomacy report explains how we will introduce greater flexibility to our IT infrastructure and enable more flexible use of information,' said foreign secretary Jack Straw.

'This includes more use of mobile and remote-working technology and new applications to make information more accessible, whilst keeping it secure. The plans we have set out are challenging but achievable. We believe they are crucial to the overall effectiveness of the FCO,' he said.

The plan represents the next stage for the FCO IT infrastructure, says head of IT strategy Nick Westcott.

'Our present global infrastructure is good, but static,' he said.

'We need to respond to the challenge and, within the constraints of budget and security, make our IT as flexible as our staff need it to be,' he said.

Over the next six years the department also aims to streamline business processes and improve connections with the rest of Whitehall.

According to the plan, by 2010 FCO staff will access a personalised desktop environment, accessible from a networked office PC or remotely. Greater availability of video conferencing facilities will enable global teams to be created irrespective of participants' geographic locations.

The plans build on the introduction of the Firecrest common application platform and FCO telecoms network (FTN) over the past three years.

'Overall we estimate that Firecrest and FTN together have accumulated benefits valued at over £100m,' says the report.

Plans for an FCO-specific system to deal with classified information have been abandoned in favour of Scope, the Whitehall-wide system currently in procurement.

The Prism programme to replace major back office systems such as human resources and finance with web-based systems encouraging employee self-service are planned to roll out globally starting this summer.