article: The Department for International Development (DfID) said last month the secretariat in London was "under performing" and needed "urgent reform". Senior diplomatic and political sources - speaking to the BBC off the record - have accused the secretary-general, Lady Scotland, of "poor leadership". But her spokesman said she had backing from all 52 Commonwealth countries that had elected her. He added that the Labour peer had also launched a programme to modernise the Commonwealth Secretariat. Tim Hitchens, a senior Foreign Office official and former ambassador to Japan, has been put in charge of a team preparing for the Commonwealth summit in London next year. Mr Hitchens, a former assistant private secretary to the Queen, will be based in the Cabinet Office and will report directly to the prime minister. Sir Simon Gass, a very senior official who retired from the Foreign Office last year, has been made acting chief operating officer at the Commonwealth Secretariat. He was appointed at the suggestion of the Foreign Office which is funding his salary. He is working directly with Lady Scotland at the secretariat's headquarters at Marlborough House in London. The appointments are being seen in Whitehall as an attempt by the government to shore up a troubled organisation at a crucial time. Ministers are keen to ensure that a meeting of Commonwealth trade ministers in London in March is a success and shows how Britain after Brexit can do more trade with countries outside the European Union. They also want to guarantee that the secretariat is capable of organising the heads of government summit next year that will be hosted by the Queen, who is head of the Commonwealth. Senior ministers will meet next week to discuss the agenda for the summit for the first time. Last week, Theresa May spoke of the "unique and proud global relationships" the UK has through the Commonwealth. The secretariat helps run the group of 52 mostly former British colonies that make up the Commonwealth and that are home to some 2.3 billion people, more than a quarter of the world's population. In a highly critical report in December, DfID threatened to withdraw its funding from the organisation unless it improved its performance. "The Commonwealth Secretariat continues to under perform," the multilateral aid review concluded. "Improvement is essential if DfID is to continue to fund the organisation's Commonwealth Fund for Technical Co-operation." This is worth about Â£20m per year. The report added that the secretariat needed particularly to focus on improving "transparency, results measurement, human resource management, risk management, financial management, and budget discipline". The secretariat said the review related to the period before Lady Scotland took up the post of secretary-general last April. Since then, the peer - who was attorney general in Gordon Brown's government - has faced much criticism. She has been accused of financial extravagance over the refurbishment of her official residence and attacked for appointing political allies to key posts in the secretariat. She has always denied the accusations of wasteful spending and insisted no procurement rules were broken. Her allies have also claimed
summary: The government has drafted in senior officials to support the Commonwealth amid concerns over the way it is being run, the BBC has learned.