Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Why splitting the Home Office up makes sense

We won’t see the full scope of what Boris Johnson plans to do for life after Brexit until the new year. There will be a few appointments this afternoon to replace gaps in the government, and then the Queen’s Speech will introduce the legislative agenda on Thursday. But the full launch of the new government won’t be until February. What we do know is that Johnson and his senior aide Dominic Cummings have got Whitehall in their sights, and are hoping to reshape government departments to make them work better.

One of the biggest changes is carving up the Home Office so that it loses its responsibility for immigration and border security, with a new ministry carrying out that function. Normally when prime ministers split departments, it is because they want to send a signal about their priorities, even if it is more efficient for two different policy areas to be based in the same building.

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