Is government policy being modelled on classic Whitehall sitcom Yes Minister? First, we learned this week that a new AI system for analysing responses to public consultations is named Humphrey, presumably a nod to the fictional permanent secretary Sir Humphrey Appleby. Now we have a chance to reprise the long-running gag about the challenge of moving senior civil servants out of London – or feeding them a diet of Lossiemouth, as Yes Minister fans might put it.

The real-life Cabinet Office this week announced that 102 Petty France, home of the Ministry of Justice, HM Courts & Tribunals Service, Crown Prosecution Service and Government Legal Department, is to close, with staff deployed to government ‘hubs’ in places ranging from Birmingham to Aberdeen to Darlington. (‘It’s in a very nice part of Darlington.’)

What will happen to the 14-storey 1970s office block remains to be seen. The building, known locally as the Lubyanka, was described by one critic as ‘that irredeemable horror’. Its first government tenant was actually the Home Office, which departed in 2005 for a glitzy purpose-built HQ on Marsham Street. But its overhanging upper floors, with their views over St James’s Park and Buckingham Palace, might convert nicely into a billionaire’s pied-à-terre.

But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Obiter recalls the valiant attempt by a previous government to move the Department of Health to Leeds: in the end, the department had to take more Whitehall space to accommodate the senior grades who apparently thought civilisation ends at Potters Bar. ‘The public knows nothing about wasting public money. We are the experts,’ as Sir Humphrey once said.

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