The Foreign and Commonwealth Office will apologise to survivors of the tsunami disaster today, after a devastating report into the failure of British diplomats to deal with the aftermath of the Boxing Day disaster two years ago.

Of the 116 people questioned for a National Audit Office (NAO) report, most had negative experiences of British officials in the aftermath of the disaster, which killed 300,000 people, including 150 Britons.

In particular, British consular officials were described as insensitive, incompetent and far less helpful than diplomats from other countries in providing emergency services.

“The British Embassy in Bangkok made promises of assistance that were never delivered,” said one British survivor interviewed for the report.

“They were ineffective/ unhelpful and hindered my evacuation. I hold the British Embassy responsible for doing nothing when they knew of our plight. Words cannot describe how disappointing and useless the staff in Bangkok, and later in Phuket, were.”

Another recalled how a group of British consular officials, on holiday in one of the affected areas, arranged for their own evacuation but abandoned their countrymen.

One respondent said he was treated so poorly that he had felt like changing nationality.

Other government agencies were also criticised. One family returning from Sri Lanka in the days after the tsunami were asked by an immigration officer why their passports were wet.

The NAO survey said that some British diplomats, their families and friends devoted hours and days to helping those in need. But it concluded that the FCO and other government agencies need better planning to cope with disasters, better training for staff, improvements in communicating and handling information and delivering long-term aftercare.

Lord Triesman, the Foreign Office minister responsible for consular affairs, today apologised to survivors for any shortcomings. He said work was already under way to improve the response to future disasters.

“The sheer scale of the 2004 tsunami meant that no organisation was able to respond as it wanted. As a result, some UK families and individuals did not get the support they could have expected to receive. We have said sorry to them,” he said.

“We are determined to learn the lessons from their experiences: we’ve been working with families, survivors and with the National Audit Office and others to do that since the immediate aftermath of the tsunami itself.”

Quotes from the survivors:

“There was nothing”

“I wanted them to know I existed. A couple of days after what happened, I would have expected some . . . support from the British Government . . .Or even just some information — you know — like the Government knows you’re here. Or this is what the British Government is doing, we’re trying to arrange flights, that kind of thing. But there was nothing.”

“They just sat there”

“British Consulate members were on holiday in the area. After the tsunami they sat in our guest house, which was just out of reach of the tsunami. They didn’t help anyone in any way, they sat there and got drunk until a minibus they had called for arrived.

“When it arrived they didn’t offer anyone else a lift to a safe area, they just left. Their conduct was disgraceful and made me ashamed to be British.”

“Get rid of that superiority”

“(I suggest we need) better trained professional British Embassy staff who do not treat the public as idiots — and get rid of that superiority. To admit that they do not know if they do not know the answer and say they will find out, instead of just bluffing and giving wrong information. I was very close to changing my nationality. In fact I thought their whole attitude was appalling.”

“We don’t have any plans”

“They went to the Embassy to get their passports and they spoke to someone and they said, ‘Look, are you going to do anything to help us get home, are you going to put us on a flight?’ and they said ‘No, we don’t actually have any plans at the moment. What we will do, we’ll take your number at the hotel and… we will phone you if we are going to do that’ . . . A couple of days later, my brother-in-law picked up a newspaper in Bangkok, and reads ‘British Government flies home survivors .” I don’t know how many but (it was) virtually empty.”

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