New laws to make public bodies publish information actively rather than just in response to Freedom of Information (FOI) requests may be needed, Scotland’s outgoing information commissioner has...
Inter-party acrimony, fuelled by the general election campaign, has left the formation of new local authority administrations in chaos across much of Scotland.
Facts and figures from the May edition of Public Finance magazine on unemployment trends, Scottish attitudes to independence and the ever-increasing retirement age
A three-year split in the national body representing Scottish local government looks set to end next month, as a consequence of the Labour vote collapse at last week’s local elections.
The new agency set up to run devolved benefits in Scotland will not follow the example set by Whitehall’s Department of Work and Pensions in using private companies to assess the entitlement of...
MSPs from across the political spectrum joined forces to lambast the Scottish Conservatives over their support for the UK government‘s two-child cap on child benefit entitlement.
MSPs have backed the principle behind Scottish Government plans to cut and eventually abolish air travel tax, but criticised finance secretary Derek Mackay for failing to commission any independent...
Scottish councils should have a general competence to do anything not specifically reserved to Holyrood or Westminster, according the right-of-centre think tank, Reform Scotland.
More than 70 schools across Scotland have been found to be suffering similar defects to those that closed 17 Private Finance Initiative schools in Edinburgh last year.
Brexit could bring Scotland’s plans for a new generation of social housing grinding to a halt, leaders of the Scottish housing association movement have warned.
The leader of Scotland’s biggest council told the CIPFA Scotland conference of his vision for a digital future in which poorer families are helped to develop internet capabilities and...
Scottish finance secretary Derek Mackay has told the CIPFA Scotland conference he expects Scottish tax policies to diverge increasingly from those of the rest of the UK.
The Scottish Parliament has formally demanded a second referendum on independence to be held within two years, a day after the prime minister told first minister Nicola Sturgeon that now was not the...
In an exclusive interview, Scottish finance minister Derek Mackay talks to PF about bargaining over the Budget and Scotland’s increasingly divergent fiscal approach
An expected vote by the Scottish Parliament formally to request the UK government to sanction a second referendum on independence has been delayed, after the sitting was suspended in the light of the...
Scottish local government reformers need to stop being fixated with numbers of councils and concentrate instead on delivering services more efficiently, according to a report from Deloitte.
Scotland’s first minister Nicola Sturgeon is to seek approval for a second independence referendum, which could take place as soon as autumn next year.
The spring Budget promised a review of taxation on North Sea assets aimed at maximising exploitation of remaining oil reserves, and on the extra £350m of “Barnett consequentials”...
Education spending by Scottish local authorities increased by 2.7% in real terms last year in spite of persistent teacher shortages and claims of under-resourcing, according to official annual...
