Subsections 6 (1) (c) and 6 (1) (d) of the Ministers and Secretaries (Amendment) Act, 1939 permit the Government to transfer functions from one Minister or Department to another, while subsections 6 (1) (a) and 6 (1) (b) authorise the Government to change the name and title of the Ministers and Departments by similar procedure. Such orders do not deal with non-statutory functions which are transferred by administrative action.
The transfer of the functions of the Department of Equality and Law Reform to the Department of Justice was effected by S.I. No. 297 of 1997, dated 8 July 1997, and the renaming of the Department of Justice was effected by S.I. No. 298 of 1997, on 9 July 1997, reducing the number of functioning Departments to 15, two below the 17 permitted under the Ministers and Secretaries Acts. The questions of assigning a ministerial seal or appointment of a Secretary General to the Department of Equality and Law Reform did not arise.
It is intended that the shell of the Department of Equality and Law Reform, along with that of the former Department of Communications, will be extinguished when the Ministers and Secretaries Acts are next amended.
