Having promised surprises, Gordon Brown was as good as his word in appointing Shaun Woodward as Northern Ireland Secretary and making Baroness Scotland of Asthal the first black and female Attorney-General.

Mr Woodward took the job rejected last week by the former Lib Dem leader Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon. There was an extra surprise: Mr Woodward, previously a junior minister, waived his salary. Formerly a Tory MP for David Cameron’s seat of Whitney, Mr Woodward defected to Labour in 1999 after opposing the party’s position on gay rights. He was an object of mirth in the 2001 general election after Labour found him the working-class seat of St Helens South.

Much media attention focused on his background as a former Tory married to a Sainsbury’s heiress and with an Oxfordshire mansion. But he campaigned consistently on equality legislation and, as a trustee of the charity Childline, for children’s welfare. He was given his first job in the Government by Tony Blair after holding his seat in 2005 as a junior Northern Ireland minister.

With most powers in the Province now shared by Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness, the remaining political task is to secure a deal to devolve policing and criminal justice from the Northern Ireland Office to the Assembly.

Gordon Brown's Black Wednesday

The Northern Rock disaster has torn away any remaining credibility the Prime Minister had

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One of the attractions for Mr Brown may have been the trophy value of having a former Conservative MP in his Cabinet, and Mr Woodward appealed for others to follow Quentin Davies, the Tory MP who crossed the floor this week to join Labour.

Lady Scotland, 51, who inherits one of the most tricky portfolios in Government, has already entered the record books by becoming the first black woman to be made a Queen’s Counsel, in 1991.

A career barrister destined to be a High Court judge, she found herself instead invited by Mr Blair into Government in 1997 and raised to the House of Lords. Two years later she made history as the first black woman to serve as a government minister.

At the top of her in-tray will be the “cash for peerages” affair, in particular the issue of whether to distance herself from any decision on prosecution. Her predecessor, Lord Goldsmith, QC, incurred criticism for insisting that he would have a role in the decision.

She inherits responsibility for the Crown Prosecution Service, and also for legal advice to ministers. She is married to Richard Mawhinney, brother of Brian, the former Tory chairman. They have two sons.

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