Cabinet Office Briefing Rooms

9 Downing Street is one of the buildings situated on Downing Street in the City of Westminster in London, England. It has been used as a separate address to the better known 10 Downing Street since 2001 for various government functions.

Downing Street is a 200-metre (660 ft) long street in the City of Westminster that houses the official residences and offices of the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Situated off Whitehall, a few minutes' walk from the Houses of Parliament, Downing Street was built in the 1680s by Irishman Sir George Downing. For more than three hundred years, it has held the official residences of both the First Lord of the Treasury, the office now synonymous with that of the Prime Minister, and the Second Lord of the Treasury, the office held by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The Prime Minister's official residence is 10 Downing Street; the Chancellor's official residence is Number 11. The government's Chief Whip has an official residence at Number 12. In practice, the individuals involved may live in different flats; the current Chief Whip actually lives at Number 9. The houses on the south side of the street were demolished in the 19th century to make way for government offices now occupied by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office. The term "Downing Street" is used as a metonym for the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, or the British Government more generally.

The Battle of Downing Street was a march of suffragettes to Downing Street, London, on 22 November 1910. Organized by Emmeline Pankhurst's Women's Social and Political Union, the march took place four days after Black Friday, a suffragette protest outside the House of Commons that saw the women violently attacked by police.

10 Downing Street (pronunciation ) in London, also known colloquially in the United Kingdom as Number 10, is the official residence and executive office of the First Lord of the Treasury, usually also the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. Along with the adjoining Cabinet Office at 70 Whitehall, it is the headquarters of the Government of the United Kingdom. Situated in Downing Street in the City of Westminster, London, Number 10 is over 300 years old and contains approximately 100 rooms. A private residence for the prime minister's use occupies the third floor and there is a kitchen in the basement. The other floors contain offices and conference, reception, sitting and dining rooms where the prime minister works, and where government ministers, national leaders and foreign dignitaries are met and hosted. At the rear is an interior courtyard and a terrace overlooking a 1⁄2 acre (0.2 ha) garden. Adjacent to St James's Park, Number 10 is approximately 3⁄4 mile (1.2 km) from Buckingham Palace, the London residence of the British Monarch, and near the Palace of Westminster, the meeting place of both Houses of Parliament. Originally three houses, Number 10 was offered to Sir Robert Walpole by King George II in 1732. Walpole accepted on the condition that the gift was to the office of First Lord of the Treasury. The post of First Lord of the Treasury has, for much of the 18th and 19th centuries and invariably since 1905, been held by the Prime Minister. Walpole commissioned William Kent to join the three houses and it is this larger house that is known as Number 10 Downing Street. Despite its size and convenient location near to Parliament, few early prime ministers lived at 10 Downing Street. Costly to maintain, neglected, and run-down, Number 10 was scheduled to be demolished several times, but the property survived and became linked with many statesmen and events in British history. In 1985, Margaret Thatcher said Number 10 had become "one of the most precious jewels in the national heritage".10 Downing Street is Government property. Its registered legal title is held in the name of Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (the Secretary of State is a corporation sole).

The Cabinet Office is a department of the Government of the United Kingdom responsible for supporting the prime minister and Cabinet of the United Kingdom. It is composed of various units that support Cabinet committees and which co-ordinate the delivery of government objectives via other departments. It currently has just under 8,000 staff, most of whom are civil servants, some of whom work in Whitehall. Staff working in the Prime Minister's Office are part of the Cabinet Office.

11 Downing Street (sometimes referred to as just Number 11) is the official residence of Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer (who traditionally also has the title of Second Lord of the Treasury). The residence, in Downing Street in London, was built alongside the official residence of the Prime Minister at Number 10 in 1682. The first Chancellor to live there was Henry Petty-Fitzmaurice in 1806, but Number 11 did not become the Chancellor's official residence until 1828.From 1997 onwards, Prime Ministers Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, David Cameron, Theresa May and Boris Johnson chose to reside for all or part of their term of office at Number 11, as its residential apartment is larger than Number 10. However, the Prime Minister's home is traditionally described being at Number 10.

The Downing Street Christmas tree is the Christmas tree placed on Downing Street, outside 10 Downing Street which is the official office and residence of the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. The tree arrives in Downing Street around the end of November with the lighting ceremony taking place at the beginning of December which is broadcast live by news broadcasters such as BBC News.

The Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) is a department of the Government of the United Kingdom. It was created on 2 September 2020 through the merger of the Foreign & Commonwealth Office (FCO) and the Department for International Development (DFID). The FCO, itself created in 1968 by the merger of the Foreign Office (FO) and the Commonwealth Office, was responsible for protecting and promoting British interests worldwide. The head of the FCDO is the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, commonly abbreviated to "foreign secretary". This is regarded as one of the four most prestigious positions in the Cabinet – the Great Offices of State – alongside those of Prime Minister, Chancellor of the Exchequer and Home Secretary. The current foreign secretary is Liz Truss. The FCDO is managed day-to-day by a civil servant, the permanent under-secretary of state for foreign affairs, who also acts as the Head of Her Majesty's Diplomatic Service. The current permanent under-secretary is Sir Philip Barton, who took office on 2 September 2020. The expenditure, administration and policy of the FCDO are scrutinised by the Foreign Affairs Select Committee.

The Honours Committee is a committee within the Cabinet Office of the Government of the United Kingdom formed to review nominations for national honours for merit, exceptional achievement or service. Twice yearly the Honours Committee submits formal recommendations for the British monarch's New Years and Birthday Honours. Members of the Honours Committee—which comprises a main committee and nine subcommittees in speciality areas—research and vet nominations for national awards, including knighthoods and the Order of the British Empire.

The Cenotaph is a war memorial on Whitehall in London, England. Designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens, it is the United Kingdom's national memorial to the British and Commonwealth dead of the two world wars, and British casualties from later conflicts. The original Cenotaph was a temporary structure erected in 1919 for a parade celebrating the end of the First World War. Over 15,000 servicemen, including representatives from France and the United States, saluted the monument during the parade. The word "cenotaph" is derived from Greek, meaning "empty tomb". Most of the dead were buried close to where they fell; thus, the temporary Cenotaph came to symbolise the absent dead, and provided a focal point for the public's mourning. Over a million people visited the Cenotaph within a week of the parade, some of whom made pilgrimages from distant parts of the country. Calls for a permanent Cenotaph began almost immediately. After some debate, the government agreed and construction work began in May 1920. Lutyens added entasis (curvature) but otherwise made minimal design alterations. The Cenotaph is built from Portland stone. It takes the form of a tomb chest atop a rectangular pylon, which diminishes as it rises. The memorial is austere, containing almost no decoration. From each side hang three flags. The permanent Cenotaph was unveiled by King George V on 11 November 1920 in a ceremony combined with the repatriation of the Unknown Warrior, an unidentified British serviceman to be interred in Westminster Abbey. After the unveiling, millions more people visited the Cenotaph and the Unknown Warrior. The memorial met with public acclaim and has been largely praised by academics, though some Christian organisations disapproved of its lack of overt religious symbolism. The Cenotaph was the site of pilgrimages for years after its unveiling, and men removed their hats while passing it. Officials attempted to avoid censoring tributes but sometimes removed those with political messages. The Cenotaph has been the scene of several political protests and has been vandalised with spray paint twice in the 21st century. The National Service of Remembrance is held annually at the Cenotaph on Remembrance Sunday; it is also the scene of other remembrance services. The Cenotaph is a grade I listed building and forms part of a national collection of Lutyens's war memorials. Dozens of replicas were built in Britain and other Commonwealth countries. While there was no set or agreed standard for First World War memorials, the Cenotaph proved to be one of the most influential. Lutyens designed several others, which all shared common features with the Whitehall monument. The Cenotaph has been the subject of several artworks and has featured in multiple works of literature, including a novel and several poems. The public acclaim for the monument was responsible for Lutyens becoming a national figure, and the Royal Institute of British Architects awarded him its Royal Gold Medal in 1921. For several years afterwards much of his time was taken up with war memorial commissions.

The Monument to the Women of World War II is a British national war memorial situated on Whitehall in London, to the north of the Cenotaph. It was sculpted by John W. Mills, unveiled by Queen Elizabeth II and dedicated by Baroness Boothroyd in July 2005. Fundraising was conducted by a charitable trust set up for the purpose of establishing a memorial, with the National Heritage Memorial Fund donating towards the project. Baroness Boothroyd also raised money on the game show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?.

The Cockpit-in-Court (also known as the Royal Cockpit) was an early theatre in London, located at the Palace of Whitehall, next to St. James's Park, now the site of 70 Whitehall, in Westminster. The structure was originally built by Henry VIII, after he had acquired Cardinal Wolsey's York Place to the north of the Palace of Westminster, following the Cardinal's downfall in 1529. It was one of a number of new pleasure buildings constructed for King Henry's entertainment, including a real tennis court, a bowling alley, and a tiltyard, and was used as an actual cockpit; that is, an area for staging cockfighting. Thus enlarged, the Palace of Whitehall became the main London residence of the Tudor and Stuart Kings of England, and the Palace of Westminster was relegated to ceremonial and administrative purposes only. The Cockpit ceased to be used for cockfighting in Jacobean times, and was used instead as a private theatre and as chambers for members of the Royal Household. It was redesigned in 1629 for Charles I by Inigo Jones as a private venue for staging court masques. It was the second cockpit that Jones had redesigned as a theatre, the other being the Cockpit Theatre in Drury Lane, which was renovated after a fire in 1617. After the London theatre closure of the Interregnum, the Cockpit returned to use under Charles II, and was refitted in 1662. A new dressing room was added for female players, whose presence onstage was a recent theatrical innovation; its walls were decorated with green baize, one possible origin of the theatrical term "green room" for a dressing room. Samuel Pepys records attending several plays at the Cockpit in his diary. In 1680, it was occupied by the Duke of Albemarle in his official capacity as Master of the Great Wardrobe, and later by Ralph, 1st Duke of Montagu in the same capacity. Charles II gave the Cockpit to Princess Anne, daughter of Charles's brother James, Duke of York, in 1683. Anne and her closest friend, Sarah, Lady Churchill were imprisoned here during the Glorious Revolution; both their husbands, Prince George of Denmark and John, Baron Churchill switched their allegiances from James II to William of Orange. Sarah and Anne escaped to Nottingham shortly afterwards. The Palace of Whitehall was almost completely destroyed by fire in 1698. One prominent structure to survive was the Banqueting House, also designed by Inigo in 1619; another, lesser, structure to survive, was the Cockpit. After the fire, William III moved his London residence to nearby St James's Palace, and the site was rebuilt to be used as government offices, and residential and commercial premises. The Cockpit was used to house government officials. It was first occupied by HM Treasury, whose offices elsewhere in the palace had been destroyed, until the Treasury moved to a new building on Horse Guards Road in 1734.When Anne became queen after the death of William in 1702, she gave the residence to her loyal friends John and Sarah, now Duke and Duchess of Marlborough. They vacated the residence during Anne's reign and it became the Treasury. After the Treasury moved, it was used in the late 18th century by the Foreign Office, after that government office had been founded at Cleveland Row, St James's but before it moved to Downing Street. Next, it was used by the Privy Council as a council chamber, for judicial purposes. It continued to be used by the Privy Council after a new chamber was built for them in 1827. The current building on the site, at 70 Whitehall, is used by the Cabinet Office. The reconstructed Cockpit Passage in 70 Whitehall runs along the edge of the old tennis courts and into Kent's Treasury, built on the site of the original cockpit lodgings. The minstrel's gallery on the ground floor is currently decorated with pictures of fighting cocks and a model of the old Whitehall palace. It should not be confused with Cockpit Steps nearby in St James Park, which lead up from Birdcage Walk past the site of a royal cockpit in Old Queen Street.