A HOME Office minister yesterday criticised her own officials over the failure to implement the scrapping of the so-called "double jeopardy" rule.

Baroness Scotland departed from her brief because she was unhappy with the suggested response that long-delayed police guidelines would be released "as soon as possible".

Until the guidelines are published, forces cannot act to re-examine cases where fresh evidence suggests a defendant was wrongly acquitted.

Answering questions in the Lords, Baroness Scotland told peers she had "strained every muscle" to give a definite date for release of the guidelines, which were first promised last June.

She agreed the Home Office must "inject a degree of urgency" to bring justice to families of murder victims.

Rejecting the stock reply of "as soon as possible", she revealed two possible release dates - March 23 and April 4. However, the Home Office cannot say which.

The Northern Echo revealed earlier this week how victims' families had waited more than a year for the new laws replacing "double jeopardy" to come into effect.

Parliament took the decision to abolish the old law, which says defendants cannot be retried for the same crime if acquitted, in November 2003 after a campaign by Ann Ming and The Northern Echo.

The relatives of 36 murder victims are waiting to see if suspects can be retried, including Mrs Ming, whose 22-year-old daughter, Julie Hogg, was murdered on Teesside in 1989.

Billy Dunlop, from Billingham, near Stockton, was acquitted of murder but later admitted killing the pizza delivery girl. Under the double jeopardy law he could only be convicted of perjury for lying under oath at the original trial.

Cleveland Police have said that they are ready to re-examine Julie's case, but insist that they are powerless to act until the guidelines are available.

Dunlop was jailed in May 1998 for assaulting a former girlfriend and received an extra six years to his sentence in April 2000 for perjury.

The issue came to a head yesterday when Lord MacKenzie of Framwellgate, a former Home Office law advisor, demanded an explanation for the delay.

In reply, Baroness Scotland said: "We very much understand why we need to inject a degree of urgency. I have strained every muscle to be able to announce a date.

"It is a matter of great frustration to me that I am not able to say why the date I would most like to pick has not been given."