Council funding will be cut by nearly 3% in England from next April, but authorities in London and metropolitan areas will face reductions of more than 4%, Local Government Secretary Eric Pickles has...
Local authorities in England are to share in an additional £2.35bn in capital funding over three years to help them create the extra school places that will be needed by 2017, Education Secretary...
London boroughs have agreed a plan to merge £20bn of pension fund assets into a singe investment vehicle in a bid to cut costs and improve investment returns.
More than half of the cost of meeting the pay claim made by local government trade unions would be recouped through higher revenues for the Treasury, a study has found.
The communities and local government select committee has launched an inquiry into pay and rewards for senior council officers, which will examine how remuneration packages are decided.
People born in the 1960s and 1970s are the first post-war generation that will be no better off than their parents, the Institute for Fiscal Studies said today
A committee of MPs has called on the government to scrap the so-called bedroom tax after finding that the reform had placed a ‘cruel burden’ on vulnerable people.
Ed Miliband today hit out at some councils for blocking development in neighbouring authorities, and pledged that a future Labour government would give town halls a ‘right to grow’.
More than a third of public sector organisations fear they do not have effective mechanisms in place to manage risk, which could leave them vulnerable to major financial and operational failures,...
The government has reached City Deal agreements with five city regions, taking the total number of pacts signed in the second phase of the programme to eight.
The Department for Communities and Local Government must do more to measure the cumulative impact of cuts on councils to ensure that town halls are able to manage the reductions, the National Audit...
Scotland’s council tax freeze will continue for a seventh year after Finance Secretary John Swinney announced that the funding given to councils for 2014/15 would be increased in cash terms.
Councils have continued to improve their financial reporting, with only one local authority – Manchester City Council – receiving a qualified audit opinion on its 2012/13 accounts, the Audit...
Soaring rents are forcing more working people to rely on Housing Benefit, with the number of employed claimants more than doubling since 2009, the National Housing Federation has warned.
The rate of UK public library closures slowed last year, with 74 libraries shutting compared to 201 in 2011/12, CIPFA’s latest library survey has revealed.
The public sector employment outlook has deteriorated in the last three months, with employers now unlikely to hire extra staff, a poll by recruiters Manpower has found.
Lurking under treacherous public spending waters is an iceberg of off-balance sheet costs and other hidden debts. Future generations will have to pick up the tab
Local Government Secretary Eric Pickles has confirmed that the government will meet the costs of the business rate reliefs set out in the Autumn Statement.
Government policies to support local economic growth such as the creation of local enterprise partnerships and City Deals may not be value for money, the National Audit Office has warned.
Chancellor George Osborne has announced that the cap limiting the amount councils can borrow to build new homes will be increased by £300m, with the allocation to be distributed through local...
A majority of councils fear that financial pressures will reach a ‘tipping point’ within the next four years when they will not be able to meet some statutory responsibilities to deliver a range of...
