Part of 2. Cwestiynau i'r Cwnsler Cyffredinol a Gweinidog y Cyfansoddiad – Senedd Cymru am 2:58 pm ar 29 Mawrth 2023.
Of course, you conflate two areas there: the role of the Counsel General and, of course, the roles of a justice Minister. Quite often, they are separate functions and those are obviously things that would want to be considered. There is no doubt that further devolution of justice, I believe, will happen, perhaps starting with probation and youth justice. Policing, to a large extent, is almost operating as a devolved function; it’s the lack of that legislative framework that properly enables the cohesion and the hegemony in terms of all those factors to operate that holds us back, to some extent. But those are areas that not only open the door in respect of the devolution of justice, but, of course, they also provide a framework for a complete change in the way in the which our combined services that contribute to the justice system actually operate.
The point you make in terms of capacity is an important one. My belief that these are very serious things will be addressed by the next Senedd, and I hope will be addressed in some of the legislation that will be coming forward. I think we do need an increase in Senedd Members and in terms of the size of the Government to enable that to happen, and, of course, it was one of the recommendations of the Thomas commission. One of the things that we have done, I suppose as the interim, as we move towards that situation, is that I work very closely with the Minister for Social Justice, so we bring those two elements together, almost as an embryonic justice function. But, in the next Senedd, and with Senedd reform and an increased size of the Senedd, it certainly is my view that the Thomas commission recommendations on the creation of a justice ministry and department will, effectively, come to fruition at that stage.