Part of 2. Questions to the Counsel General and Minister for the Constitution – in the Senedd at 2:32 pm on 9 February 2022.
Well, I thank you for the question and I do support the proposal that has been made and welcome the statement that's been made. I can inform you, in fact, that myself and the Minister for Social Justice met approximately several hours ago with Lord Wolfson to actually discuss the very announcement and what the implications would actually be. These, of course, aren't new jobs, but they're jobs that, as individuals retire or leave, will be transferred to seven new regional hubs.
I think what is unclear is the timescale over which this will happen, because it seems that there are a number of factors. The point I made is: well, of course, if there are going to be significant numbers of Ministry of Justice jobs transferring to Wales, there might be opportunities in terms of doing something about the appalling state of the Cardiff Civil and Family Justice Centre—an issue where there are real concerns in terms of the facilities that are available, but just the very message that is sent out by the state of that civil justice centre and the need for a new purpose-built civil justice centre in Cardiff. And that would be an opportunity, wouldn't it, to actually look at where Minister of Justice facilities are placed. Unfortunately, it doesn't look as though there is going to be any significant progress on the civil justice centre, but, in terms of the jobs, we will of course give every co-operation and liaise and engage over how best to facilitate this, as we are doing in fact over other areas of co-operation within the justice field with the Ministry of Justice and with the various areas that are within Welsh Government responsibility.