The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister has published draft capital finance regulations that will govern the new system of prudential borrowing for local authorities.
A local authority was left seething this week after ministers turned down its application to place 13,000 council homes in the hands of an arm's-length management organisation.
Councils will have to produce just eight major service plans by 2006 after ministers unveiled details of long-awaited cuts in the number of documents that must be submitted to Whitehall.
The...
Money for housing management and maintenance is to be redistributed from London to the north of England.
The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister said that new formulas for paying £3bn worth of...
Need a cataract operation, a hip replacement or a heart by-pass? Don't fancy the interminable wait at your local hospital? Fear not.
Within two years, according to plans announced last week by...
The cost of transferring the Government Communications Headquarters' computer systems increased more than 20-fold during its move to a new building in Cheltenham, a National Audit Office report has...
It would seem the Department for Education and Skills has learned its lesson.
The funding allocations for schools descended into confusion and mutual recrimination earlier this year, following the...
A timetable for the introduction of proportional representation in local government has been set out by the Scottish Executive.
In a consultation paper, the Executive says the Local Governance (...
The government's attempt to defuse long-standing criticisms of the Private Finance Initiative by tackling some of its more obvious flaws has been greeted with suspicion by the public sector trade...
NHS financial discipline must be tightened and deficits eradicated, Welsh Health Minister Jane Hutt warned this week after a far-reaching review claimed that demand could overwhelm services in the...
The minister charged with tackling delays in housing benefit payments across UK councils has acknowledged that millions of pounds earmarked for improvements this week will not be enough to eradicate...
Government plans to introduce NHS foundation trusts were hanging in the balance despite this week's narrow victory, after a furious Commons' debate on the issue.
Minister for Children Margaret Hodge is to propose a commissioner for children in a green paper to be published in the autumn.
She told a Local Government Association conference on July 8 that the...
Transport Secretary Alistair Darling has launched a massive road-building programme and signalled that the government's long-term aim is road pricing.
Darling said: 'On any view, existing capacity...
The Local Government Association's hunt for a successor to Neil Kinghan has been thrown into disarray after top Treasury mandarin Adam Sharples turned down the job, Public Finance has learned....
The possibility of a merger of the ombudsman services for local authorities, central government and health has receded indefinitely, local government ombudsman Tony Redmond has complained in his...
Imposed targets and growing local autonomy must proceed hand-in-hand to improve public services, a study of some of England's best councils concludes.
The Improvement and Development Agency,...
Threatening to prosecute parents has caused a marked reduction in classroom truancy, the government claimed this week.
Figures from the Department for Education and Skills on July 2 showed that...
Fire authority employers have warned of further industrial strife in the wake of the plans to overhaul firefighters' working practices and service structures.
An influential think-tank has criticised relations between council officials and civil servants in Scotland.
A Scottish Council Foundation report, Innovation in public services, resulted from a...
The government's anti-age discrimination proposals unveiled this week should not force employees to work until they 'burn out' before they qualify for pensions, Unison has warned
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'.
Patients harmed by substandard NHS care will be offered an explanation and compensation of up to £30,000 under proposals unveiled this week that aim to cut the burgeoning health service clinical...
The Audit Commission has given in to pressure from council leaders and scaled back plans to increase the thresholds between performance categories when the Comprehensive Performance Assessments are...
