Much to reform

Scandals at the Home Office have ceased to shock. It emerged last month that 540 Britons who committed serious crimes abroad have been free to apply for jobs from which they should have been barred, 147 drugs traffickers have defied travel bans and 322 registered sex offenders have simply disappeared off the official radar, while Home Secretary John Reid predicts problems to get worse. There is a good case that recent scandals may be the result of individual rather than institutional failings. But something is clearly awry, and, at the least, Reid is right to assert that “there must be no sacred cows when it comes to protecting security and justice”. He takes the view that the very structure of his department must be overhauled, proposing a radical dissolution of the Home Office by dividing its powers and responsibilities between two new ministries, one responsible for prisons, probation and criminal justice and the other for counter-terrorism, policing, and immigration. But his plans have been attacked by, among others, his two most recent predecessors as Home Secretary - Charles Clarke and David Blunkett.

Clarke’s main concern, aired yesterday in an interview with Sky News, echoes previous Conservative critiques of Reid’s plans: dividing the Home Office risks exacerbating its main weakness, that of a worrying “lack of co-ordination between its various elements”. The scheme also has obvious implications for the separation of powers between the judiciary and the other branches of government, with the judicial administration of the Department for Constitutional Affairs subsumed within a broader ministry of Justice. But David Blunkett’s worries were of a different order. Alongside illiberal musings that Continental ministries of Justice entailed exaggerated clout for “the judiciary and those most concerned about protecting the perpetrator”, the Labour MP for Sheffield Brightside - Home Secretary from 2001 to 2004 - told ITV that defenestrating the Home Office would have serious implications for democracy in the UK. Within Cabinet, a powerful Home Secretary balances the posts of Prime Minister and Chancellor. Reform risks the “Balkanisation of government”, with multiple ministers inevitably concentrating power in the hands of the top two in Downing Street.

Individually, separated Justice and Security ministries would indeed be weaker than the current Home Office, while British government undoubtedly lacks checks on the power of Numbers 10 and 11. But it would be wrong to maintain a leviathan at the expense of efficient security and justice simply for the sake of balance. The dynamics of cabinet government have always shifted and evolved. Gordon Brown wields unprecedented influence as the current Chancellor of the Exchequer, while it was only in the 1960s and 1970s, with the growing politicisation of its security functions, that the Home Secretary came to challenge the precedence of the other Great Office of State, the Foreign Secretary. Today the current malaise of his department rather undermines the ability of the Home Secretary to impose himself in Cabinet, and it is to rewrite the past for Blunkett to claim he ever approached the power of Brown or Blair.

Several factors have led to a concentration of political power at the centre over the past quarter of a century. Modern politics is largely post-ideological and personality driven, with political parties inextricably intertwined with their leaders in the minds of the electorate. Important too has been the entrenched position of the then governing party, granting its leadership greater freedom and confidence. In the 6 elections from 1983, power has changed party hands only once, with the government enjoying majorities of over 100 for 17 of those 24 years (1983-1992 and again 1997-2005). In the previous six elections (1964-1979) the governing party was re-elected only when it called an early poll, in March 1966 after 17 months and in October 1974 after less than 8, while before 1983 no election had delivered a majority of over 100 since 1945’s Labour landslide. The British political system has long been a tyranny of the Commons, with an emasculated House of Lords and head of state, but we can no longer rely on the Commons itself to provide checks on the centre. Rather than propping up the Home Office beyond its useful lifespan, what are needed are alternative foci outside the lower house. Decentralisation and greater autonomy for local councils would be one effective means of achieving this. A largely elected upper chamber would create alternative leaders with the legitimacy to challenge the Prime Minister. So too would an elected head of state.

David Blunkett is right to fear such a concentration of power in the hands of so few, but John Reid’s plans for the Home Office should be judged only on their ability to improve its efficacy. Rather than looking a ailing department, those hoping for a balanced political system in Britain should seek to pluralize power beyond the Commons.