Every local authority will be asked to explain its education budget decisions in an attempt to resolve the row between ministers and councils over allocations to schools.
Education Secretary...
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...
A three-year government review of rent restructuring has been criticised by the Chartered Institute of Housing for avoiding major questions.
The review, launched by the Office of the Deputy Prime...
Gordon Brown has the reputation of a chancellor who likes to spring surprises when he steps up to the dispatch box to deliver his Budget statement.
But this year the surprise came at the expense...
MPs this week launched a scathing attack on the government's complex community regeneration initiatives, claiming that Whitehall has too much control over the budgets for local schemes.
The Commons...
Gordon Brown opened a new front in the government's ongoing battles with trade unions this week when he used his Budget statement to indicate a move towards regional pay settlements.
Government reform of unemployment services, announced in this week's Budget, could lead to 'widespread short-termism' across the sector, the leading civil servants' union has claimed.
Officials at...
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...
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...
The government's transport policy is destined for failure unless it sets out its intentions on road pricing and presents a credible plan for cutting pollution and congestion, a committee of MPs has...
Neglect by the former Railtrack has landed its public interest successor with a soaring infrastructure bill.
Network Rail's business plan, published on March 31, showed that maintenance, operating...
Local government leaders hit out at the government this week after Nick Raynsford demanded an explanation from authorities for the 'excessive' council tax increases that some have levied.
The Department for Education and Skills has accused the London Borough of Croydon of needlessly withholding money from schools.
In a funding row that shows no signs of abating, Croydon and...
Conservative Party leader Iain Duncan Smith has vowed to scrap NHS waiting list targets if the party wins the next election, under plans outlined in a consultation document.
Tapping into the...
Suspicions among council highways and transport officers that their budgets are being plundered by education and social services colleagues have been reinforced by the Commission for Integrated...
The head of the NHS's newly beefed-up counter fraud and security agency has vowed to clamp down on violent assaults against staff in the sector after union claims that the number of incidents is on...
The increased use of an expensive drug has helped a campaign to cut the number of deaths from coronary heart disease, the national heart director said this week.
Launching a progress report on the...
The next 12 months could make or break the government's public services reform agenda, the new leader of the union movement has warned.
In an interview with Public Finance , Brendan Barber, who...
Central and local government must 'give up a bit of power' to tackle social exclusion in partnership with voluntary and community bodies.
That was the message from Office of the Deputy Prime...
The trust that built the first major Private Finance Initiative hospital lacks leadership and has failed to meet the needs of the local community, according to reports this week.
Government ministers have conceded that they will not stand in the way of attempts to make the BBC more accountable to licence-payers.
MPs rejected proposals to open the corporation up to public...
The row over the education 'passporting' fiasco escalated this week, when the Local Government Association accused Charles Clarke of effectively ringfencing cash from council tax rises.
A letter...
The Liberal Democrats outlined their alternative 'cash-back' Budget this week, pledging free care for the elderly and the abolition of tuition and top-up fees for students, but no increases in public...
Growing use of tools such as offshore bank accounts to avoid paying tax could be costing the Treasury billions of pounds in lost revenue every year. Measures to combat the problem should be taken...
Charles Clarke's determination to force two councils to 'passport' education funds is nothing short of a unilateral declaration of independence against the rest of Whitehall, the chief executive of...