More than a quarter of acute NHS trusts now have greater freedom from Whitehall control, following the authorisation of eight new foundation trusts this week.
The Department of Health is considering compensating social services departments for the increased burdens created by cuts to NHS services, Public Finance has learnt.
Councils are warning that they are being starved of vital resources to fund basic services because of the government's inability to produce accurate immigration figures.
The proposal to open NHS commissioning to private companies envisages that primary care trusts will be able to choose whether or not to use these services. But PCTs look likely to be pressed to do...
The voluntary sector and private providers face many of the same problems in dealing with the public sector. But they are capable as competitors and in alliances of greatly improving service...
The chief executive of the Local Government Association tells Joseph McHugh about the push for greater autonomy and diversity in the provision of council services
The Department of Health should return part of the £504m deducted from the deficit-hit NHS under its application of the Resource Accounting and Budgeting regime, the Audit Commission has said.
Lone parents on income support should be able to keep all the child maintenance they receive under the government's reformed child support system, a former welfare minister has argued.
The Department of Health has failed to prove that its policy of outsourcing half a million patients to private treatment centres provides value for the extra cost it entails, the Commons' health...
What has a philosophy designed to revolutionise car production got to do with the public sector? Well, quite a lot, it turns out. Zoe Radnor and Paul Walley explain how 'lean thinking' is crossing...
This week's call for means-tested charges for NHS services is wrong-headed. Such a move would raise few funds, deter the wrong people from using health care, and undermine the consensus that backs...
The police service is breathing a sigh of relief that it has been saved a costly and unnecessary restructuring but it still faces a catastrophic funding crisis from 2008. Chief constable Tim Brain...
It seems that time is running out for the big regeneration programmes. But, despite government rhetoric about 'mainstreaming', practitioners fear that their resources might not transfer into the...
The Department of Health has admitted that its payment by results hospital funding scheme has led to a deterioration in care for older people, has 'not worked' for specialist children's hospitals and...
Mental health trusts have been asked to curb their spending to help other parts of the NHS balance their books, according to the Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health.
The Commons' health select committee has asked the government to review the system of prescription and other NHS charges and to consider whether charges for services 'not clinically necessary' could...
Whitehall officials must improve the design and operation of the administrative systems underpinning UK services if targeted public sector improvements are to be achieved, influential MPs have warned.
Sir Jeremy Beecham's review shows that reform of public services in Wales is on the right track but needs to progress further and faster. The Welsh Assembly Government welcomes the challenge
Managers who 'lost their grip' were blamed this week by the Audit Commission for the financial crisis in the NHS organisations with the most serious deficits.
