The Conservatives’ shadow schools secretary is finding himself in an increasing muddle as he starts to put flesh on his schools’ policy. One day Michael Gove is extolling the virtues of free schools, liberated from the shackles of Whitehall, with the touchy-feely charms of Goldie Hawn jostling alongside Swedish companies to deliver. Days later he is laying down the level of detailed knowledge that every youngster should have of their kings and queens, their classical poetry by heart and their algebra under the tutelage of the Tories’ maths mistress Carol Vordeman. Read more...
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John Appleby
Melissa Benn
Stephen Court
Stephen Court is senior research officer at University and College Union...read more
Carl Emmerson
Steve Freer
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Jenny Owen is president of the Association of Directors of Adult Social Services...read more
Conor Ryan
Colin Talbot
Colin Talbot is a professor at the University of Manchester Business School... read more
Tony Travers
Heather Wakefield
Heather Wakefield is Head of the Local Government Service Group of Unison...read more
David Walker
David Walker is MD, communications and public reporting, at the Audit Commission...read more
Latest posts
Costing a council tax freeze, by the Institute for Fiscal Studies
In his 2008 Conservative party conference speech, Shadow Chancellor George Osborne announced that an incoming Tory government would freeze council tax in England for two years. IFS researchers estimated at the time that if this policy were implemented in 2009-10 and 2010-11 it would cost £1bn in its second year, in 2008-09 prices. Over the past month, the parties have been disputing how much it would cost if an incoming Conservative government were to implement it in 2011-12 and 2012-13. Read more...
4 March 2010 | Institute for Fiscal Studies
Follow the money, by Judy Hirst
The markets, we are told, do not like uncertainty. Neither do public sector finance directors. That’s why, as the pound plunged this week, in response to speculation over a hung Parliament, those in charge of public service budgets were still preparing for the worst. Read more...
4 March 2010 | Judy Hirst
Chelsea pensioners, by Heather Wakefield
As if Chelsea losing 4-2 to Manchester City wasn’t bad enough! I was in a stunned and unusually muted queue descending the Matthew Harding lower terraces on Saturday, when a nearby fellow Blue – generally more prone to pies than conversation – managed to punctuate my aura of despair by asking what was happening to his council pension. Read more...
3 March 2010 | Heather Wakefield
What about the workers? By John Tizard
At a time when it is reported that local authorities and other public sector bodies are planning dramatic reductions in their workforces and as claims are made that Total Place could save the public purse over £20bn, it is time to consider the workers. Read more...
1 March 2010 | John Tizard
Tough call on care costs, by Richard Humphries
This year’s general election could be the first in which social care is a key campaign issue. Everyone agrees that sorting out the wicked issue of paying for care needs consensus. But electioneering is about conflict, demanding that each party demonstrates loudly how different they and their policies are from each other. So the collapse of private, cross-party talks aimed at establishing a political consensus, and the welter of misunderstanding and mutual recriminations that followed, should not come as a great surprise given the proximity of polling day. Read more...
27 February 2010 | richard humphries
Unitary disunity, by Jim Brooks
The recent announcement of a unitary authority for both Norwich and Exeter is another twist in a long story of indecision and failure by government to provide national leadership in the structure of local government in England. Read more...
26 February 2010 | Jim Brooks
Tougher than Thatcher? By the Institute for Fiscal Studies
‘Whoever wins the election, Labour or Conservative, is going to have to cut spending. That is not something that Margaret Thatcher actually did. So tougher than Margaret Thatcher.” So said George Osborne on the BBC Radio 4 Today Programme this morning – and the numbers by and large bear him out. Read more...
26 February 2010 | Institute for Fiscal Studies
Non-executive nightmare, by Malcolm Prowle
The recently published report into the appalling failings of the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust brings the issue of organisational governance once more back into the spotlight. Read more...
26 February 2010 | Malcolm Prowle
Reset the retirement timetable, by Jon Sibson
This generation is enjoying longer lives and longer periods of retirement than any of its predecessors. It’s a result of improved standards of living, medical advances and other factors and is clearly very good news in many ways. But these big changes also create a number of significant challenges, especially to the government’s fiscal position through higher costs of state pensions, health and long-term care. This challenge is compounded in the UK (and other advanced economies) by the retirement of the baby-boom generation during the next two decades. Read more...
25 February 2010 | Jon Sibson
Tax-break tension, by Mike Thatcher
Councils, it seems, are back in favour. After years of being viewed with distrust by Whitehall, they are now ministers’ new best friends. Read more...
25 February 2010 | Mike Thatcher
Parent power battles, by Conor Ryan
Today’s announcement by Gordon Brown that the Government is accrediting the best academy providers, plus some excellent secondary schools, as schools providers, with parents having the power to demand change, is a significant step forward in Labour’s schools policy. Until now, the party had appeared far too defensive in the face of Michael Gove’s Swedish free schools policies, allowing the Tories to adopt Labour’s academies as their own. The Brown speech opens up a new front in the schools battle that I described recently in Public Finance. Read more...
23 February 2010 | Conor Ryan
Do cuts spell doomsday for higher education? By Stephen Court
Some commentators are presenting a doomsday scenario for higher education. Thirty institutions may not survive, suggests one. Recently announced cuts will bring the sector to its knees in six months, says another. Read more...
23 February 2010 | Stephen Court
Unpicking pay levels, by Duncan Brown
Disgraceful isn’t it, what those public sector managers are paying themselves these days? Who would believe that we have a record public sector deficit forecast to reach almost £200 billion, yet those nice people at the Taxpayers Alliance tell us that there is “an explosion” in the numbers of public servants paid over £100,000, over 1,000 of them in fact. Their Public Sector and Town Halls’ Rich List shows that 12 local authority and NHS trust chief executives are even paid more than the Prime Minister! As we know, his salary of £197,000 is a wonderful benchmark, given how much prime ministers can earn in their subsequent careers. Read more...
22 February 2010 | Duncan Brown
Power struggles, by Graeme Cooke
All the main political parties say they want to give people power. But they often don’t start with a clear understanding about the causes of powerlessness. Read more...
19 February 2010 | Graeme Cooke
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