Split the Home Office into two new, more focused Departments, says think-tank

• The Home Office has presided over numerous policy failures, and shows no signs of improving.

• The Department’s remit is too wide, and the political team at the top is not scaled to the size of the tasks confronting it. Inevitably the Home Secretary of the day over-promises and under-delivers.

• The Home Office should be split into two more manageable departments; Immigration and Security.

• Rishi Sunak’s Ten-Point Plan for Immigration concluded with “commissioning work to look at more fundamental Home Office and Border Force reform.” This would be a good place to start. 

A new report, A Broken Home: Why It’s Time to Split up the Home Office, from the Adam Smith Institute (ASI) outlines how the Home Office has been facing criticism from those on both the left and right of politics on its handling of a wide range of issues, including channel crossings and police failings. The principal problem is not that it is staffed by bad people. The Department’s remit is too wide and the political team at the top is not scaled to the size of the tasks for which it is responsible. The Ministry of Justice has a similar number of political staff, despite the much smaller Whitehall operation those working there need to oversee. The outcome is that the Home Office often makes no forward movement on major policy agendas at all. Secretaries of State make bold promises and then under-deliver, creating a gap between rhetoric and reality which both undermines public faith in Government and the Conservative’s reputation on law and order. 

Report author, Henry Hill, argues that the Home Office should be broken up into two separate departments- an Immigration Department and a Security Department. The former would be responsible for immigration policy and enforcement, asylum, passports and the Home Secretary’s existing broad powers to set immigration rules. The latter would be responsible for policing, counter-terrorism and the security services. 

The chief advantage of this reform would not be that it would automatically produce any particular change in policy. But it would mean that each Department would have a narrower and more coherent portfolio of responsibilities, and would be able to get on with huge policy challenges, including MET police reform, small boats and security. It would also improve accountability to Parliament, as Ministers would be able to have a much clearer oversight over the Department’s work. 

Henry Hill, Deputy editor at ConservativeHome and report author said:

“Today's Home Office is a relic from an era when government was smaller and departments fewer. It oversees too much, and encourages secretaries of state to try and micro-manage controversial issues. On immigration, policing and security we need better policy, faster delivery, and clearer accountability - and breaking up this leviathan is the way to do it.”

Daniel Pryor, Head of Research at the Adam Smith Institute said:

“For far too long, the Home Office has failed to make substantial progress on vital policy areas which have real quality-of-life implications. Instead it has continued to over-promise and under-deliver, undermining faith in our institutions. It is high time that this sprawling empire is broken up. The new Prime Minister now has the opportunity to deliver real reform and create a more efficient government.” 

-ENDS- 

Notes to editors:  

For further comments or to arrange an interview, contact Emily Fielder, emily@adamsmith.org | 0758 477 8207.

Henry Hill is the Deputy Editor of ConservativeHome. He also writes widely for other outlets and was the co-author, with Andrew Yong, of the ASI’s previous paper ‘Global Britons: A Fairer Path to British Citizenship.’

The report will be live on the Adam Smith Institute website from 10pm Thursday 27th October and is available here. 

The Adam Smith Institute is a free market, neoliberal think tank based in London. It advocates classically liberal public policies to create a richer, freer world.