Global Affairs numbers show disproportionate level of cuts to staff based overseas

OTTAWA — Canada’s foreign service cuts are disproportionately affecting positions based abroad, with those rotational positions being eliminated at three times the rate of those for Global Affairs staff based in Canada.

Data obtained by The Canadian Press also shows an even larger drop in foreign workers hired at missions overseas, just as the Carney government seeks deeper diplomatic and trade ties with other countries.

“They’re not understanding the business they’re in. And the business that they’re in is not spreadsheets,” said Jeremy Kinsman, a former ambassador to Russia, the U.K. and the European Union.

“It may be a symptom or a reflection of the discrepancy between Ottawa-based employees who haven’t served abroad, who don’t understand.”

Global Affairs Canada said it is seeking efficiencies while pursuing the government’s agenda of diversifying trade and advancing Canadian interests abroad. Ottawa is cutting staff across departments to fund a surge in defence spending.

For weeks, staff at GAC have seen a regularly updated account on the department’s intranet system of how many layoffs and buyouts the department has been trying to undertake, sorted by various divisions.

The department provided The Canadian Press with that data as well as its latest tally of cuts.

As of March 31 this year, GAC was set to have 2,878 rotational positions — excluding short-term contracts — down from 3,221 a year prior, a cut of 10.6 per cent. That figure includes but is not limited to diplomats.

Non-rotational positions were set at 6,624 employees who serve only in Canada, down from 6,868 staff — a cut of 3.5 per cent.

Kinsman said those changes will “astoundingly aggravate the disparity” between the number of diplomats posted abroad and the size of the workforce in Ottawa. He said the department is placing a premium on reporting and paperwork instead of pursuing tangible results through diplomacy.

“I would invert those statistics and I would slash headquarters of staffing, to whatever degree is possible without causing undue harm, and I would really focus on maintaining foreign service officers,” he said.

The data also shows that Canada is planning to drop 754 postings for foreign workers abroad — including 290 unfilled positions it intends to let lapse — over the next three years.

That will mean a 13.8 per cent drop in the number of what the department calls “locally engaged staff,” down from the 5,450 foreign staff GAC employed as of Jan. 1 this year. GAC says most of those cuts will take place in 2026.

Kinsman said that means losing out on “tremendous” input from locals who tend to receive a local wage and don’t need the relocation and school fees Canadian diplomats require.

“We get their contacts. Their job is to scour the landscape that they’ve grown up in, that they live in, that they work in. and put us together with people,” he said.

“They have an intelligence-gathering capacity which is really unsurpassed.”

GAC said it is trying to find efficiencies through, among other things, better use of technology. The number of staff in administrative roles abroad, especially Canadians, is receiving a disproportionate cut.

Canada still retains Canadian citizens for certain roles in diplomatic missions abroad, such as overseeing information technology systems in sensitive countries.

“Workforce adjustments for the (Comprehensive Expenditure Review) were determined based on operational requirements, reviewing how work and services are organized across the department, using a common approach applied consistently in all areas,” wrote GAC spokesman John Babcock.

“This approach ensured decisions were made in a fair and balanced manner, rather than disproportionately affecting any particular group.”

In a briefing binder prepared for Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand for her testimony before a House committee last November, Global Affairs said that 49.6 per cent of its workforce was located abroad but 80 per cent of those positions are held by foreign workers hired in the host country.

Just 20 per cent of GAC staff based abroad were Canadian citizens — 1,420 workers, or 16.7 per cent of all Canadian citizens employed by the department.

GAC said in a statement it should still have roughly half of its staff working abroad after it makes all planned budget cuts.

The union representing diplomats says the cuts put more pressure on an already overstretched workforce.

“As the bargaining agent and professional association representing Canada’s 2,200 foreign service officers, we are very concerned about cuts to Canada’s capacity abroad at this pivotal moment in our history,” wrote Pam Isfled, head of the Professional Association of Foreign Service Officers.

“Behind every visit and every new cooperation agreement or trade deal are dozens — if not hundreds — of PAFSO members and others, working for weeks, months and even years to make the moment happen.”

Kinsman argued Canada does not deploy enough diplomats abroad and there’s an “overload” of staff in Ottawa.

“Other countries, by and large, privilege their representation abroad rather than, let’s call it the back-office headquarters staff,” he said. “It’s overstaffed, it’s over-layered. And they’re spending an awful lot of time with people in meetings.”

There is little research available on how countries deploy their foreign service officers and how different countries compare.

A 2025 audit of Britain’s foreign service showed 27 per cent of British citizens working in the foreign service were based abroad, compared to 16 per cent of Canadian citizens working for GAC being posted abroad.

And 53 per cent of employees of Britain’s foreign service were foreign employees who were hired locally, compared to 39 per cent of Global Affairs Canada’s total staff.

In 2022, France’s foreign ministry reported having 74 per cent of staff working abroad and 26 per cent staying in France, though the numbers do not indicate how many are French nationals and foreign employees.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 20, 2026.

Dylan Robertson, The Canadian Press