Our aim is to build fair, effective and accessible justice services, which contribute towards a safe and secure society and protect the rights of citizens; and to modernise the law and constitution.
It is our core business now to deliver those fundamentals - justice, rights and constitutional reform.
| If you have any comments on our change programme please email the Change Team. |
Since 1997 the LCD has grown from a small, quiet department run by lawyers and focussed on the legal professions, to a central Whitehall department with such important responsibilities that we are now virtually the Department for Justice, Rights and the Constitution. Although this may not be our name, it is now our core business to deliver those fundamentals - justice, rights and constitutional reform.
The Department has taken on an ever-expanding remit, with only modest increases in resources, so that a major change programme is required to refocuss the work of the whole Department. It is only on the basis of that change programme that we can expect to get the resources we need to do the job we want to do; and effectively to tackle the even bigger tasks ahead than those we have handled already.
Slide showing the added responsibilities
LCD has already had some real achievements:
Reforming the civil justice system.
Making substantial improvements to the legal aid system - for the customers and for the taxpayer.
Devising and rolling out the Community Legal Service throughout England and Wales - a highly innovative concept of government working in partnership with local authorities, legal professionals and charities.
We have introduced the Criminal Defence Service; and CAFCASS for children in court; and the Public Guardianship Office.
We have managed a big increase in judicial appointments and set up the Judicial Appointments Commissioner.
We are on the way to major reform of the tribunals system.
The Court Service has also made real progress:
in improving the quality and efficiency of the courts and responded to massive expansion in immigration and asylum work.
It has introduced some innovative new services - particularly Money Claim on line and Xhibit, which are admired across Europe.
It has had extraordinary success so far as CharterMark is concerned and aims for all courts to be accredited within the next two years.
This has all been achieved without any basic changes to how the LCD works. We have just 'bolted on' new roles and added a corporate board based on individual functions. We have been "making it work".
But just "making it work" is not a strategy for the future. That's not how to build a Department able meet the Government's delivery agenda and match the best in the modern Civil Service. It's not how to build a Department where people want to work.
Our staff told us there has to be a step change in how the Department works if they are to be confident that LCD can tackle even more challenges in the future.
In particular staff are seeking:
strategic vision and stronger leadership
clear priorities matched to resources
increased capacity to deliver
a united, coherent organisation
So, in July 2002, as a result of our increased Departmental responsibilities and feedback from our staff, the LCD Corporate Board initiated the Departmental Change Programme. The Office of Public Services Reform was invited to help us and to consult with our customers and stakeholders, our partners in the justice system and members of staff from around the Department.
The OPSR Change Team reported to the Board in October 2002. Their proposals were radical: and their proposals are now ours. Our aim is to create a positive and exciting future for the LCD and a step-change in customer service - not just to address the shortcomings we have already identified.
The proposals build on our strengths:
Our aim is to change the culture of the whole Department. We must:
become better at understanding what our various customers need and want - not just in day-to-day delivery - but in longer term planning and strategy to recognise and predict the trends and changes which will affect what our customers should be able to expect from us;
drive up customer satisfaction with our services by bringing our operational units closer together and focussing them on common issues and high standards of delivery. This includes the Court Service - and then the new unified courts structure and the Legal Services Commission, the Public Guardianship Office and CAFCASS; and through them, and directly, all the others who help in the private and public sectors;
build and sustain more effective relationships with our key stakeholders. This includes No 10, the Treasury and other Government departments so that we are successful in Spending Reviews and in continuing to attract high calibre people to the Department, and in enabling LCD staff to develop their careers around Whitehall; and
we need not just to manage but to develop our relationship with the judiciary and the legal professions. Uniquely for any department of Government we stand at the frontier of the relationship between two arms of the State - the executive and the judiciary: a relationship of independence and partnership.