Social mobility has stalled, despite the government's best efforts to raise the aspirations of children from working-class homes. Effective reform of local services will be crucial to turning this...
The government needs to put its house in order over how it approaches its much-publicised efficiency drive or it may find that the result is to make the public sector even less effective than it was...
A conflict between the government's private investment programme in schools and the education white paper means it must choose between escalating borrowing costs or significantly reducing its...
First Minister Jack McConnell hinted at the prospect of a reorganisation of local government in Scotland as local authorities set council tax levels with an average rise of 3.3%.
Whitehall's counter-terrorism strategy since the London bombings has focused on reducing risks, but communicating that to the public has proved difficult.
& is a problem halved. But not when public bodies can't agree on the best ways to collaborate. Judy Hirst explains why sharing services is so hard to do
Labour's plans for more housing depend on developers paying for the accompanying infrastructure with a new planning gain supplement. But there is opposition to this tax on building, as Mark Smulian...
When the National Audit Office investigated Whitehall's efficiency savings it found that they weren't all they seemed. Some were aspirational, some weren't efficient and others couldn't be proved....
The Private Finance Initiative has never been a free lunch for the NHS. Now even the Treasury seems to be losing its appetite for large PFI hospital schemes. Noel Plumridge explains why
Ministers have been accused of political expediency, amid mounting speculation that decisions have been taken to reorganise local government and delay the 2007 local elections.
The government's gamble to persuade rebel MPs to back its education reforms by offering concessions over admissions procedures and the role of local authorities might still fail, opponents have told...
Bailiffs have been called in to collect an overdue £420,000 in business rates from the University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust in Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt's constituency.
The official overseeing Whitehall's £40bn efficiency agenda this week urged public bodies to rethink plans to share back-office services, amid Treasury concerns that too many 'centres of excellence'...
Critics of local government's structure need look no further than Durham to support their case against two-tier councils. Would a unitary approach across England produce less confusion, while...
The introduction of payment by results has put large capital building programmes under the spotlight, as it becomes clear that the new finance system will struggle to pay for long-term PFI...
As struggling NHS trusts face a year of even more cost pressures, targets, efficiency savings and payment by results, they will have to use every wile they can to attract patients. Seamus Ward...
Lenders and developers are showing renewed interest in housing schemes funded through the Private Finance Initiative, a leading civil servant said this week.
The Home Office is set to move a key accounting unit from Liverpool to its London headquarters to help prevent a repeat of the 'spectacular' financial errors unearthed by auditors this week.
A 'year zero' comprehensive spending review of all public sector spending in Northern Ireland has been announced by secretary of state Peter Hain. The review could lead to the abolition of some...
The government was this week accused of failing Britain's poorest groups after it emerged that up to £7bn in benefits went unclaimed in 2003/04, while take-up of key welfare payments has fallen since...
Voluntary organisations can reach parts that monolithic public services can't even get close to. And the government is waking up to their importance in areas such as employment services and welfare...
Local government minister and political wunderkind David Miliband has been tipped as a potential Labour prime minister. Vivienne Russell meets a minister who is very much on the move
