Question to the Attorney General:

To ask the Attorney General, what processes his Department has in place to (a) record and (b) monitor undertakings made by (i) the Treasury Solicitor and (ii) other Ministers and officials in his Department.

The Law Officers are responsible fot eht oversight of the Law Officers' departments, namely the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), the Serious Fraud Office (SFO), His Majesty's Crown Prosecution Service Inspectorate (HMCPSI) and the Government Legal Department (GLD), as well as the Attorney General's Office.

In the case of the CPS and the SFO, the relationship with those bodies is provided for in statute and is described as "superintendence", and both are underpinned by Framework Agreements published on Gov.uk. Oversight of the GLD is underpinned by a Framework Agreement, and by a protocol in the case of HMCPSI.

The Treasury Solicitor is the Permanent Secretary of the GLD and the GLD's own guidance in respect of undertakings is to "avoid giving undertakings unless strictly necessary", and that if it is absolutely necessary to give an undertaking, GLD lawyers should do so only in accordance with the Solicitors Regulation Authority's Code of Conduct 2011.