The Home Sweet Home Office
It is again symptomatic of the shambles which has now descended on this Government that yesterday the Prime Minister indicated an open mind about whether the Home Office should be split in two – the Big Story of the weekend – and which conveniently happened to push Ruth Turner of Downing Street fame off the front pages.
You would not believe it but the Home Office is a much smaller animal than it used to be. Two relatively new departments, Culture Media and Sport and Constitutional Affairs have taken on chunks of Home Office’s former remit (licensing, gambling, broadcasting, the fire service and so much more). Yes it is true that worldwide migratory flows are not likely to abate, and yes we face terrorism not rooted in territorial claims but religious fundamentalism, and is therefore more difficult to identify and prevent.
Key parts of the Home Office do not communicate with each other. Charles Clarke had to resign over foreign prisoners because the prison department failed to talk to the immigration service. It is the antithesis of joined up government. The words whelks and stalls spring to mind.
This morning a Labour MP jokingly suggested to me that perhaps the Home Office should be split three ways. Why not? Another headline.
You couldn’t make it up…