The Irish economy, feted by Alex Salmond, might end up needing IMF support packages and could be evicted from the eurozone. Now there is a concern that the effects will spread to Northern Ireland
Details have been announced for a £4bn funding framework to provide academy schools in areas in England not yet running a Building Schools for the Future scheme
The work and pensions select committee joined the chorus of concern about the government’s flagship Flexible New Deal programme as unemployment figures continue to grow
Health Secretary Alan Johnson has told MPs it is ‘inconceivable’ that the NHS will face real-terms spending cuts from 2011, when the government aims to restore the public finances after...
The Healthcare Commission has praised the treatment of military personnel injured on the front line as ‘exceptional’ and rehabilitation services as ‘excellent’.
MPs have condemned shrinking investment in defence research, saying Britain’s military capability and role in the world could be diminished unless the cuts are reversed.
The financial crisis has thrust Treasury select committee chair John McFall into the limelight. He talks to Judy Hirst about bankers, bonuses – and dealing with hooligans
The lights are on in the Treasury but who’s minding the tills? After hiving off so much responsibility for fiscal and monetary policy, the department is not in good shape to tackle the biggest...
The banks have been pulling out of the Private Finance Initiative and the contractors are struggling. As a scheme designed to transfer public sector risk becomes a growing liability, frantic efforts...
The Conservatives have called on the government to use public funds to rescue Private Finance Initiative projects that have ground to a halt because of the credit crunch
Plans to reduce police bureaucracy, which the Home Office claims will save 260,000 hours a year, have been given a lukewarm reception by bodies representing the force.
The long-term effect of the economic downturn on the public sector will be to focus attention on cost-cutting, warned the Treasury’s director of public services
An overhaul of attitudes to fiscal responsibility is needed if the US is to remain the world’s pre-eminent economy, former US comptroller general David Walker has warned
The Audit Commission has admitted to MPs that councils’ treasury management capability was not on its ‘risk radar’ until after the Icelandic banking fiasco that has swallowed up £...
Local authorities and central government have set up an emergency ‘Salt Cell’ to ensure there is enough gritting salt for roads, as the extreme winter weather continues
A programme designed to tackle fuel poverty has directed help to people who do not need it while omitting many who do, a National Audit Office probe has found
