The National Union of Teachers has welcomed the Department for Education and Skills' hardline approach to school absenteeism, which will target the parents of 8,000 'serial truants'.
The architect of Whitehall's £40bn savings plan believes ministers will seek to achieve public sector efficiencies beyond the target date of 2008 because of the political imperative to restrain...
Tony Blair and Gordon Brown are meant to be as one on the need for radical public sector reform. But as Blair embarks on one of his last Party conferences as PM, his quest for a legacy is bringing...
They call him the 'smiling assassin' and he's certainly ruthless about improving education. DfES permanent secretary Sir David Normington talks to Maria McHale about his role and rumours of an...
The Commission for Social Care Inspection has condemned the government's plans to move its children's services remit to an enlarged Ofsted as 'incoherent', 'illogical' and 'dangerous'.
Senior trade unionists have called on Chancellor Gordon Brown to make good his commitment to the 2004 Warwick accord, amid concerns that public employers are using a loophole in the two-tier...
Social landlords are being sold short by the government in their attempts to build sustainable communities, the new leader of England's housing associations warned this week.
New Cabinet secretary Sir Gus O'Donnell has indicated that he could tighten up Whitehall's decision-making to help restore trust in the machinery of government.
Schools are improving, but some are still performing well below their best. Ofsted chief David Bell explains how a lean, mean, new inspection regime will sweep up these laggards and help them to...
A new dawn of co-operation between central and local government broke this week as Education Secretary Ruth Kelly indicated her willingness to work closely with councils on her planned education...
It's difficult to see local government as the stuff of good theatre. But David Edgar's play uses infighting at a failing council to make some trenchant points about democracy. Joseph McHugh reports
It seems the 'Berlin Wall' dividing health and social care might finally be coming down, as ministers finalise a combined white paper. But will this lead to a merger of social services departments...
The joint government/trade union body the Public Services Forum has swung into action to set up two panels to assess problematic sickness absence and diversity issues.
A small rise in the number of playing fields in England is not enough to mask the dramatic loss in facilities that has taken place over the past 13 years, sports campaigners said this week.
For all the talk of a dramatic urban renaissance, population flight from Britain's city centres to suburbia and the countryside continues apace. Tony Travers explains what needs to be done to reverse...
Schoolchildren from the poorest families are failing to match the attainment levels of their more affluent counterparts, the education secretary admitted this week.
The CBI is warning the government that 'short termism' in its procurement practices is preventing external service providers from bidding for contracts and undermining provision, Public Finance has...
The new head of the NHF will be seeing his Edinburgh home only at weekends from now on. But that's a small price to pay for a man with a mission, he tells Neil Merrick
James Plaskitt, the new benefits minister, has given the strongest indication yet that the Child Support Agency could continue to operate in its current form, despite calls for it to be closed.
