Ministry of Justice in new shakeup

All change at the Ministry of Justice

Tuesday, 29, Jan 2008 12:00

The Prison Service and Probation Service are to be merged with the National Offender Management Service (Noms) in the latest home affairs governance restructure.

Justice secretary Jack Straw announced the move as the main outcome of a review of the Ministry of Justice's (MoJ) structure initiated after its creation in May last year.

Then the Department for Constitutional Affairs was abolished and the Home Office split into two, a move masterminded by Tony Blair's troubleshooter and former home secretary John Reid.

From April 1st this year the restructure comes into effect, creating a new Noms which the government says will be better equipped to reduce re-offending and improve access to justice.

"The new structure will provide the MoJ with a sharper focus on its key priorities," Mr Straw said, highlighting the value of "streamlining leadership" across the department.

"These changes will ensure a more joined-up approach to issues of justice and constitutional reform and will ensure that we create the right conditions for the delivery of the MoJ's wide agenda."

Opposition parties attacked the reorganisation as an admission that last year's restructuring had failed, however.

Shadow justice secretary Nick Herbert said the move was "farcical", "even by the government's own standards".

"The government's strategy for reducing re-offending is in tatters," he commented.

"We were promised end-to-end offender management but all we've had is wall-to-wall government incompetence."

Liberal Democrat justice spokesperson David Heath was equally critical, describing the existing Noms as "over-bureaucratic".

"After a year of crisis Jack Straw has now rearranged his senior management, and in the process ditched the organisation which was meant to transform the prisons and probation services," he said.

"No wonder we have prisons bursting at the seams, a demoralised probation service, and prisoners held in police cells at a cost greater than sending them to a luxury hotel."