'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-...
The National Audit Office has warned that government departments risk losing out on the benefits of future Private Finance Initiative projects if they do not grasp the basics of refinancing.
Incentive payments for consultants who spend most of their time working for the NHS and a scheme to elevate junior doctors to consultant level earlier in their careers could form pillars of the...
The visibly deteriorating state of council housing is a political predicament that has haunted successive governments.
In Scotland, the issue of how to tackle an outstanding repair and investment...
Another local authority has pulled out of the government's stock transfer programme because it would prefer to find other ways of improving its housing.
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 confirmed the appointment of James Strachan, currently chief executive of the Royal National Institute for the Deaf, as the new chair of the Audit Commission.
Sir Jeremy Beecham has made a last-ditch plea to the government to scrap plans to fine authorities deemed responsible for bed-blocking, in advance of next week's Queen's Speech.
Official complaints about elected members of public bodies have risen dramatically in the past few months, following the introduction of a new code of conduct for councillors, the Office of the...
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...
London Mayor Ken Livingstone is likely to oppose government plans to combine the 2004 local elections with the European elections because he fears voters could be confused by the number of ballot...
The Ministry of Defence's £3bn contract for a new generation of attack helicopters faces delay, according to a National Audit Office report published this week.
The MoD is buying 67 Apache...
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...
While ballot frenzy hit London Labour Party ranks this week with the closing round to choose its mayoral candidate for the 2004 elections, the Liberal Democrats admitted that they had no interested...
The effect of Home Secretary David Blunkett's latest attempt to combat Britain's rapidly growing prison population is 'a drop in the ocean' and should be accompanied by wholesale reform of the...
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.
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...
Naïve housing associations are rushing into risky deals over key worker accommodation, a leading lender said this week.
Malcolm Kitchener, a general manager at Nationwide Building Society,...
