Gordon Brown can demonstrate his seriousness about constitutional reform by creating a new department to handle these matters. In the process, he could reduce the number of government departments by two. Hold on, didn’t we have a Department for Constitutional Affairs? We did, for nearly four years, until it was abolished nine days ago and transformed into the Ministry of Justice.

That is precisely the problem. The new ministry handles the post-arrest criminal justice system as well as civil justice: the courts, legal aid, prisons and probation. It is supposed to be the judges’ ministry, as they have been saying this week.

This is an odd home for constitutional issues such as electoral administration and reform, freedom of information, and royal questions; plus the future of the House of Lords and party funding. Admittedly, ministerial responsibility for the latter two at present lies with Jack Straw, the Leader of the Commons, reflecting his political experience and weight.

A Brown government would expand the constitutional agenda in many ways: looking at ministerial prerogatives, such as taking military action, major public appointments, as well as wideranging issues of individual rights and how far to go down the road of a written constitution. It would be absurd to leave the constitution as a small part of a larger department mainly concerned with justice issues, and without even direct representation on its official management board.

Moreover, the territorial departments are an anomaly. There is no case now for a separate Scotland Office, and a decreasing one for a Wales Office now that more legislative responsibility has been devolved to the Welsh Executive and Assembly.

The revival of devolution has reduced the workload of the Northern Ireland Office. The abolition of separate Secretaries of State would enhance, rather than weaken, devolution, while removing wasteful duplication. Alex Salmond, confirmed as First Minister yesterday, does not need a minder, least of all a Labour one.

There is a case for creating a new department of the constitution and the nations — a grand enough title for any minister — to absorb these functions, relations with Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast as well as other odd bits and pieces around Whitehall, like the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.

That would permit a serious focus on constitutional issues, as well as sorting out responsibilities with the Electoral Commission, which have been mishandled so far by the Government.

Such a post could be held by the number two in the Government, whether or not that person is called Deputy Prime Minister, or by the Leader of the Commons. That could be Jack Straw if he is not Chancellor, Foreign Secretary or Home Secretary.

Much will depend on whether the Secretary for Justice and Lord Chancellor remain in the Lords. There are lots of undercurrents about judges’ anxieties, and whether there is just one Cabinet minister in the Lords, rather than two, as now.

Giving the job to a senior minister is necessary to avoid the muddle which has marked changes since 2001, a prerequisite if we are to have, in Mr Brown’s probably overoptimistic words, “a shared national consensus on constitutional reform”.

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