30 Facts About Antonia Romeo

Dame Antonia Rebecca Caroline Angharad Catherine Romeo is a British civil servant.

Antonia Romeo is currently serving as the Permanent Under-Secretary of State at the Home Office since April 2025.

Antonia Romeo was the permanent secretary at the Ministry of Justice and Clerk of the Crown in Chancery, the permanent secretary at the Department for International Trade and before that, the British consul-general in New York for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and concurrently director-general for economic and commercial affairs in the USA.

Antonia Romeo's mother worked full-time as a professor of biochemistry.

Antonia Romeo was educated at North London Collegiate School and then Westminster School.

In 1996 Antonia Romeo joined the strategic consultancy firm Oliver Wyman where she worked for three years.

In 1999 Antonia Romeo left the firm and earned an MSc in economics from the London School of Economics.

In 2000, Antonia Romeo applied for a one-year temporary contract as a professional economist in the Lord Chancellor's Department.

In 2004, returning to work after the birth of her first child, Antonia Romeo became the head of the Information Rights Division within the new Department for Constitutional Affairs, in charge of freedom of information and related government policies.

In 2008, Antonia Romeo transferred to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office as the Director of Whitehall Liaison Department, responsible for the FCO's relations with intelligence agencies and other government departments.

In 2011, after 18 months at the Cabinet Office, Antonia Romeo moved back to the Ministry of Justice, taking on the role of Director General, Transformation.

Antonia Romeo was made responsible for reform and savings programmes, strategy, digital services, communications, group HR and group estates.

Two years later, Antonia Romeo changed role to Director General, Criminal Justice, taking over from Helen Edwards.

Antonia Romeo left the role in February 2015 and was succeeded by Indra Morris.

Antonia Romeo's work involved coordinating policy advice to the Prime Minister and the Cabinet, oversight of the Implementation Unit, and the operation of the Implementation Task Forces.

Antonia Romeo later said that the Cabinet Secretary Jeremy Heywood had asked her to stay in the civil service, and encouraged her to take on a role in New York as the Government's envoy to the tech sector.

From October 2015 to 2016 Antonia Romeo served as the government's special envoy to US technology companies.

In July 2016, Antonia Romeo was appointed Her Majesty's Consul General in New York, replacing Danny Lopez.

Aged forty-one, Antonia Romeo was the first woman to hold the position in its two-hundred-and-thirty-one year history.

Antonia Romeo left the role as Director General Economic and Commercial Affairs USA in March 2017, after nine months.

In January 2017 Antonia Romeo was appointed as permanent secretary of the Department for International Trade.

Antonia Romeo's team was tasked with ensuring that the UK was prepared to leave the EU on 29 March 2019.

At DIT Antonia Romeo was in charge of trade policy, trade negotiation and market access arrangements with countries outside the EU, global trade promotion and finance, and inward and outward business investment.

Antonia Romeo was keen to expand in the US following its success on the Trump campaign.

In January 2021 Antonia Romeo moved back to the Ministry of Justice as permanent secretary.

Antonia Romeo authored Charles III's Coronation Roll and presented the Roll and its digital version to their Majesties, The King and Queen at Buckingham Palace in May 2024.

Antonia Romeo is President of the Whitehall Choir, an amateur choir in London.

Antonia Romeo is a member of the Civil Service Board.

From 2016 to 2021 Antonia Romeo was a Member of the International Advisory Board of British American Businesses.

Antonia Romeo married John Romeo, a managing partner in charge of North America for Oliver Wyman, and has three children.