Almost five years after it was first produced, a damning report into the operation of the Attorney General’s chambers has finally been made public.

The independent review of the structure and processes of the AG’s chambers by respected UK barrister Stephen Wooler was never made public when it was issued in 2012 - and even Tynwald members were only circulated an executive summary.

Now that executive summary has finally been released following a Freedom of Information request.

The review was commissioned by the then chief minister Allan Bell and came at a time when the prosecutions division was said to be in total disarray during the period when Stephen Harding remained suspended as Attorney General.

In his highly critical report, Mr Wooler found there have been no effective arrangements in place to manage the AG’s Chambers for a number of years.

Its structure, management arrangements, responsibilities and the way it discharged them had all developed in a piecemeal way, he concluded.

Relationships with the judiciary and the police were poor, indeed those with the judiciary in the Court of General Gaol Delivery had reduced to an ’unacceptably low level’, characterised by a ’poorly disguised’ absence of mutual respect which needed to be addressed as ’matter of urgency’.

As a result this was affecting confidence in the system as a whole and the reputation of the AG’s chambers.

The chambers had taken over responsibility for prosecuting summary cases in 2009 but the transition had been poorly handled.

The crisis point came in 2011, found Mr Wooler, with lack of management and management skills, staff shortages and prosecution cases insufficiently prepared.

Senior staff were left ill-equipped to deal with the hiatus resulting from the unplanned lengthy absence of the newly appointed Attorney General, Mr Harding.

Mr Wooler concluded there were ’undoubtedly’ a large number of cases which were withdrawn or disposed of by accepting a plea either to a lesser offence or on the basis of agreed facts which fell short of the original prosecution case.

Difficulties within the prosecution division were made worse by the attitude of some staff who are defensive about criticism to the point of being dismissive and, in some cases, arrogantly so, the report states.

But he said there were many positives included the skills and professionalism of the lawyers.

Mr Wooler’s main recommendation was that a second Crown officer be appointed to support the full range of duties performed by the Attorney General.

Advocate Walter Wannenburgh was appointed to that new position of Her Majesty’s Solicitor General in March 2015.

Mr Harding retired on health grounds last year.