Fire authority employers have warned of further industrial strife in the wake of the plans to overhaul firefighters' working practices and service structures.
Town hall leaders this week hit out at ministers for relegating councils to the sidelines in the rush to reform public services, and promised to 'fight for local government'.
Local authorities should have the power to decide whether their tenants have the right to buy their homes in any part of their area, the Local Government Association has told MPs scrutinising the...
Education employers are to push for the abolition of the School Teachers' Review Body in an attempt to wrest back control over pay negotiations from Whitehall.
The chair of the National Employers'...
Britain's public services are dogged by poor performance and high levels of customer dissatisfaction, while critics who believe privatisation has escalated problems are using the excuse as a '...
The government 'talks the talk' on granting the public sector more local autonomy, but when problems arise it immediately reverts to its centralist tendencies, the director of the Institute for...
Lack of financial management in schools was a 'critical factor' in this year's funding crisis, the Local Government Association claimed this week.
In comments likely to further inflame the debate...
It is dramatic, to say the least: applications for asylum fell from 8,900 last October to 4,565 in March this year just as Tony Blair suggested and in line with his promise to cut the monthly...
It has had more false starts than the 1993 Grand National, but the end now finally looks in sight for the year-long firefighters' dispute.
In what has turned into a bitter test of union, central...
Ministers and doctors' leaders reached an impasse over the future of the NHS consultants' contract this week.
Amid a growing sense of crisis, the British Medical Association gave the government a...
Town hall leaders will use their top-level meeting with government ministers next week to demand assurances that councils will not be sidelined by the much-vaunted policy of 'new localism'.
Fears...
Few finance managers feel able to express strongly positive views on the success of e-government plans
Last week's local election results will have given comfort to e-government enthusiasts...
Labour has held on to power in the devolved administrations, strengthening its position in the Welsh Assembly but losing six seats in the Scottish Parliament.
Welsh Labour leader Rhodri Morgan said...
The cost of running central government has risen sharply, according to figures released by the Treasury this week.
Central administration and associated spending were the highest for 18 years,...
Just one in five young voters bothered to show up at the polling booth in the 2001 general election, the first major study of first-time voters has shown.
Researchers found that only 21% of 18 and...
Non-profit-distributing public interest companies have a 'potentially important role' to play in public service delivery, says a new report from the Institute for Public Policy Research. But it warns...
NHS consultants this week threatened industrial action over their contracts despite the government's abandonment of plans to make them work over weekends and in the evenings.
Last year, consultants...
Head teachers this week accused ministers of playing a deliberate 'smoke and mirrors' game with education budgets, using 'double or triple counting' tricks to play up bottom-line increases in funding...
Ian Pearson, Northern Ireland Office minister for economic policy and finance, has announced the members of the province's new Strategic Investment Board.
The directors will be Nigel Hamilton, head...
Weaknesses in the Department for Work and Pensions' computer system hamper efforts to increase the take-up of benefits among elderly people, the Public Accounts Committee has said.
Between £930m...
Twenty-two luminaries from the world of local government are to scrutinise how Whitehall funds town halls, as the balance of funding review finally got under way this week.
Local government...
Rail unions have reacted with dismay to revelations that firms involved in the controversial part-privatisation of the London Underground will be fined just £4m for major disruption on the network...
The Liberal Democrats pledged to abolish council tax and replace it with a locally set income tax, as they launched their campaign on March 31 for the May council elections.
Local government...
