[2] Its over 19,000 members include Whitehall policy advisers, middle and senior managers, tax inspectors, economists and statisticians, government-employed lawyers, crown prosecutors, procurators fiscal, schools inspectors, diplomats, senior national museum staff, senior civil servants, accountants and National Health Service (NHS) managers.

[3] Its federal structure means that some sections of the union operate under separate branding.

It describes itself as "FDA - the union of choice for senior managers and professionals in public service".

Although the terms first and second division clerks were abolished in the 1920s, it proved impossible to agree on an alternative name, and the name remained until 2000 when, following a motion to the union's annual delegate conference, the official name became "FDA".

[10] In 1996, the then Labour Party leader Tony Blair was criticised after he nominated the outgoing FDA General Secretary Liz Symons for a peerage.