Hardly had Philip Barton’s feet touched the ground in Delhi as the British high commissioner to India in succession to Dominic Asquith than he is being pulled back to London to head the enlarged Foreign Office as its new permanent under-secretary.

On September 1, Barton will take over as the most senior diplomat in charge of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office that has been created by subsuming the Department for International Development (DFID) into the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO).

The appointment has been made by Boris Johnson and the foreign secretary Dominic Raab, but the brains behind the merger is thought to be the Prime Minister’s chief political adviser, Dominic Cummings.

Not everyone thinks the merger is a good idea but Raab described Barton as “an outstanding public servant and diplomat with experience across all areas of foreign policy. Philip is well placed to bring together the talent and expertise of both departments while helping combine our foreign and development policy in a way that is innovative, ambitious and more integrated than ever before”.

Barton said in a statement: “I am delighted to have been appointed as the Permanent Under-Secretary of the new Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office. I look forward to bringing together our diplomats and development experts to deliver for the people of the UK and act as a force for good around the world.”

Barton, who was born in 1963, and, unusually for a high flyer, is not an Oxbridge man. He studied economics and politics at Warwick University and has a Master’s degree in economics from the London School of Economics. He joined the foreign office in 1986 and has served as high commissioner to Pakistan and deputy ambassador in Washington.

He has worked in intelligence and prior to arriving in New Delhi last month, he helped the UK government adapt its long-term planning to the coronavirus pandemic.

When he presented his credentials to President Ram Nath Kovind on July 8 in a virtual ceremony, he had added a personal touch: “My mother was born in Shimla and I was posted here in Delhi in the 1990s. I met my wife, Amanda, when we both lived and worked here and we named our daughter ‘India’ -– not knowing I would return one day as high commissioner.”