The Department for Education and Skills has attempted to defuse the growing row over top-up fees for university students by publishing a consultation document hinting that a graduate tax may be a...
NHS trusts that are developing Private Finance Initiative projects should not place 'undue emphasis' on demonstrating savings against a Treasury-funded project, the National Audit Office said this...
It was sheer luck that no patient suffered serious illness as a result of serious failings at Barnet and Chase Farm NHS Trust, a health watchdog has found.
The government does not take the issue of fraud seriously and has failed to introduce even the most basic preventative measures, according to maverick MP Frank Field.
'They are going up the Swanee if someone doesn't give them money,' Mayor Ken Livingstone is reported to have said last weekend of PFI contractors Amey and WS Atkins, leading players in the public-...
Officials at the Department for Education and Skills, possibly working under instruction from the former secretary of state, undertook a media campaign to dismiss the chair of the exams watchdog...
David Normington, permanent secretary to the Department for Education and Skills, has admitted he was 'ashamed' by the DfES's involvement in the Individual Learning Accounts debacle and revealed it...
Transport commissioner Bob Kiley has attacked London Regional Transport for giving 'illegal' financial guarantees to one of the consortiums involved in the controversial part-privatisation of the...
New Labour's obsession with public sector targets has distorted the abilities of the education and health sectors to deliver services the public needs, MPs have heard.
The government has ditched business services firm Capita as its partner to develop a successor to the crisis-hit individual learning accounts.
The Department for Education and Skills announced last...
The Office for National Statistics this week mounted a staunch defence of the way it compiled the 2001 census after fears about the data grew.
Members of the London Assembly are urging its budget...
John Prescott was this week unveiling long-awaited planning reforms just as his housing minister firmly indicated that Labour had failed to meet its affordable housing objectives.
Schools could soon be hosting health and social services, citizens' advice bureaux and even post offices under a pilot scheme to extend their use in the community.
Schools minister Cathy Ashton...
The Audit Commission will not take into account local authorities' financial resources or levels of deprivation when grading them under the Comprehensive Performance Assessment, it has confirmed....
The independent review into the fire service will not be rushed into reporting early, its chair told Public Finance this week as ministers and the TUC scrambled for a solution to halt the impending...
The government's plans for individual learning accounts were rushed through with no proper quality assurance or security systems in place, according to the National Audit Office.
The public...
The wrong kind of sand and 'unexpectedly hot' conditions in a desert were among excuses that embarrassed military officials this week provided for a bungled exercise to test British troops'...
Teaching unions are deeply divided over government plans to cut teachers' workloads by employing 50,000 new classroom assistants.
Education and Skills Secretary Estelle Morris announced proposals...
The Local Government Association has condemned the government's plans to fine councils that delay patients' discharge from hospital as a 'spectacular own goal' that could cost some social services...
The widely anticipated suspension of the Northern Ireland Executive and Assembly on October 14 was preceded by a flurry of important announcements by ministers before they left their jobs.
The Commons' Public Administration Select Committee is to launch a wide-ranging inquiry into the effects of targets and league tables on the public services.
Local authorities have vowed to step up the campaign to wrest more freedoms from Whitehall, despite the Treasury embracing a 'new localism' for decision-making.
The government will fail to meet its recruitment target of 15,000 extra GPs and hospital consultants by 2008 because it is not training enough doctors, a leading health care think-tank said this week...
