The NSW Attorney-General is being sidelined while the Police Minister has been given unchecked powers to make laws, the peak body for solicitors has warned in a scathing assessment of law and order policy in the state.

As Deputy Premier and Police Minister Troy Grant champions a controversial new bill for "serious crime prevention orders", the NSW Law Society warned of an "alarming development which sees the police in the dual role of making and enforcing the law without appropriate review or oversight".

The bill, which is expected to be debated in May, would allow the Director of Public Prosecutions, the NSW Crime Commissioner or Police Commissioner to apply to a court for the new orders, which could restrict a person's movements for up to five years.

The orders could be made not only against a person convicted of a serious criminal offence but those involved in "serious crime-related activity", even if the person has not been charged or convicted of a serious crime. The nature of the orders is open-ended but could include curfews and orders that a person not associate with a person or group.

The NSW Bar Association said on Wednesday the bill "effectively sets up a rival to the criminal trial system" and is "contrary to the administration of criminal justice by a process of trial".

It comes on the heels of another controversial bill which would allow a senior police officer, rather than a court, to make a "public safety order" to ban a person deemed a serious risk to public safety from a public place or event for 72 hours.

The NSW Law Society said the bills, both introduced by Mr Grant, raised "serious concerns about the encroachment on a number of fundamental rights".

The society's president, Gary Ulman, pointed to administrative changes introduced by Premier Mike Baird from April 2014 which axed the Attorney-General's department and brought it under the control of the police minister under a new justice department. The new "Justice Cluster" is headed by Mr Grant.

Mr Ulman said the changes meant police were "ostensibly responsible for criminal law policy, while at the same time, the traditional roles of the Attorney-General as first law officer of the state, which includes preserving civil liberties, are being eroded".

The new arrangements had "altered the independent role of the Attorney-General to function" as the state's first law officer, Mr Ulman said.

"If, as appears to be the case, policy advice has been centralised in the police portfolio, then the essential balancing of views [between portfolios] has been compromised. The Law Society is strongly of the view that the current arrangement only serves to undermine public confidence in the administration of justice."

Asked if Mr Baird would consider a review of the administrative arrangements, a spokesman said: "No."

"All those within the government who are tasked with keeping our community safe will continue working closely together to achieve exactly that," the spokesman said.