Trading standards departments need to work more closely with each other and with the Office of Fair Trading, according to separate reports from the Audit Commission and the National Audit Office.
League tables could be introduced across the criminal justice system after a critical National Audit Office study found up to £84m could be saved by eliminating waste and spreading good practice.
Doctors' allowances are under threat following an Audit Commission report showing that fraud perpetrated by general practitioners in England has increased tenfold in the past year.
A High Court victory by homeless families who objected to being placed in seaside accommodation will add to the spiralling cost of homelessness in London, local authorities warned this week.
Seventeen local authorities placed under 'special measures' by the government have complained that they were treated unfairly by being named and shamed by social care minister John Hutton.
Councils have accused the government of penalising them for innovation by denying them cash for policies which are later recommended and funded by the government.
A rise of 7% has been forecast in council tax almost three times the rate of inflation in the next financial year, with householders facing an average £56 increase in their bills.
Directly elected mayors for major cities in England and Wales could be in place as early as spring 2001 as the government this week signalled it wanted to speed legislation through parliament.
The Treasury is to more than double the number of cross-government spending programmes but has played down claims that this is an assault on the financial independence of individual Whitehall...
The influential Performance and Innovation Unit (PIU) at the Cabinet Office is to investigate which public services can be delivered electronically and to examine the respective roles of both the...
The National Association of Head Teachers has accused local education authorities of undermining school self-management and creating a dependency culture because of the way they distribute grants to...
Housing maintenance was this week placed ahead of long-term management improvements when local authorities were given an extra £67m to spend on council house repairs next year.
The chief secretary to the Treasury, Andrew Smith, is to create a series of Service Delivery Agreements spanning the whole of government, he reveals in this week's Public Finance .
The government will put local government political reorganisation on the fast track next week when it publishes the bill that will pave the way for directly elected mayors.
Two senior government ministers have set out to find a cure for the plague of form-filling and local government is due to be one of the chief beneficiaries.
An improvement agency covering the whole of the public sector in Scotland could be set up, following the publication next month of a report by the Best Value Taskforce.
The Local Government Association has accused education minister Estelle Morris of 'scaremongering' after she warned that a further 15 local authorities might have their services privatised in a drive...
The government's crackdown on fraud in the National Health Service started in earnest this week with new powers for the NHS Tribunal to disqualify practitioners who have committed fraud.
The new team to promote the Private Finance Initiative will help councils overcome any skill shortages that may stop them pressing ahead with schemes, finance directors have been told.
