SENIOR ministers should take full responsibility for the fall-out from the police inquiry into Home Office leaks, Tory frontbencher Damian Green said yesterday, after prosecutors decided he will not face criminal charges.

Mr Green said officials had felt the need to call in Scotland Yard because of the embarrassment caused to their political bosses by a string of damaging headlines.

He stopped short of accusing Home Secretary Jacqui Smith of direct involvement, but said the affair was the result of the “atmosphere” in Government caused by ministerial anger over the leaks.

Ms Smith defended her department’s role, saying it would have been “irresponsible” not to have acted.

Senior civil servants faced questions over the claim that leaks had damaged national security.

That was directly contradicted by Keir Starmer, the Director of Public Prosecutions, who said the leaked information was “not secret information or information affecting national security”.

He said the material was not damaging enough for charges to be brought against either Mr Green or Christopher Galley, the Home Office civil servant behind the leaks, and some of it “ touched on matters of legitimate public interest”.

He added: “It did not relate to military, policing or intelligence matters.

“It did not expose anyone to a risk of injury or death. Nor, in many respects, was it highly confidential.

“I have therefore decided there is insufficient evidence for a realistic prospect of conviction against Mr Galley or Mr Green.”

But he said a police investigation was “inevitable” because of the damage the leaks were doing to the Home Office.

Mr Green said he was “very pleased” that he would not face charges and said publicising the leaks was the job of Opposition.

But Ms Smith said she had a “responsibility” to keep information safe.