Is Blair keen to take on judges?

By Nick Assinder
BBC News Online political correspondent

By any measure, Lord Woolf's criticisms of the government's legal shakeup and its plans for dealing with asylum seekers are severe.

Blair wants to take on vested interests

It probably doesn't get much more serious than accusing a government of undermining the rule of law, for example.

Yet ministers appear more than usually relaxed about his criticisms when they insist the proposals will go ahead unaltered.

First there is the proposal to take senior judges out of the political House of Lords, where they act as the final court of appeal, and put them in a new, non-political supreme court, thus removing any possibility, no matter how slight, of a conflict of interest or political interference.

Then there are the plans to limit the rights of appeal of asylum seekers to stop failed claimants playing the system to stay in Britain for years.

More battles

But, as ever, it is the detail which is causing the problems, with claims the new supreme court will actually be more open to political influence because it would, in effect, be under the authority of the Home Office.

Similarly, the asylum plans are attacked for denying one group of individuals the rights of access to the law available to everyone else.

Lord Woolf has condemned government policy

And all this comes against the backdrop of the wider constitutional issues including abolition of the Lord Chancellor and reform of the House of Lords.

These have already sparked serious concerns and could all see yet more battles between the Commons and the Lords.

Yet Tony Blair, a trained barrister married to one of the UK's highest profile QCs, appears determined not to be "cowed" by the judges.

Indeed, there are even suggestions that he is perfectly happy to take on the most senior judges in the land - and that may be at the centre of his determination over these issues.

The first reason for this apparently combative approach is relatively straightforward and contained in the government's response to Lord Woolf.

Ministers are responding to the concerns of voters, it insists.

Human rights

It is indeed the case that the issue of asylum, in particular, is a major cause of concern amongst some groups of voters.

The underlying message is that the problem is so severe that unusually tough measures are required to deal with it.

The prime minister's critics, however, might fear this is an example of the government bowing to the sort of right-wing agenda propagated by the BNP.

And Lord Woolf believes it represents an unprecedented assault on basic human rights.

The supreme court proposals are attacked for addressing a problem that does not exist and actually threatening to make the possibility of political interference more, rather than less likely.

The second reason why the government appears so relaxed over the attacks, is that it is perfectly happy to be seen taking on powerful, establishment interests.

These issues may not immediately grab voters' attention.

But, even if they do, the prime minister is probably gambling that in a bare knuckle fight with senior figures in the legal system, with them dressed in their "old fashioned" wigs and clothing, voters will rally to his side.