Created in 1885[1] as the Lord Chancellor's Office with a small staff to assist the Lord Chancellor in his day-to-day duties, the department grew in power over the course of the 20th century, and at its peak had jurisdiction over the entire judicial system and a staff of over 22,000.
The Lord Chancellor was the only cabinet minister (other than those without portfolio) not to have a department of civil servants answerable to him, and justified the expenditure of creating a permanent department by saying that: The Lord Chancellor, though Minister of Justice for almost every purpose unconnected with the Criminal Law, had no assistance of the kind given to the other chief Departments of State, either of permanent secretaries or under secretaries.
[3] The need for the office was partly due to the Supreme Court of Judicature Acts of 1873 and 1875, which significantly changed the structure of the courts and increased the Lord Chancellor's workload as he struggled to enact the changes that the Acts required.
[5] The office was initially little more than a personal entourage for the Lord Chancellor and did little administrative work, with it being described in 1912 as "not far removed from an interesting little museum".
[6][full citation needed] The appointment of Claud Schuster as Permanent Secretary in June 1915 changed this; he set about reforming the office to allow it to effectively run the court system.