Audit, Inspection and Safety

Big rise in complaints to Home Office, DWP and MoJ

20.05.13: New data published by the Parliamentary Ombudsman highlights the variation in complaints to different Government departments. The move aims to encourage public sector organisations to use complaints to improve the services they offer. The r...

Mutual Respect campaign for road safety

03.05.13: A new campaign to boost road safety has been awarded £424,000 funding, Scottish transport minister Keith Brown has announced. Cycling Scotland’s Mutual Respect Campaign will be launched in August, for cyclists, motorists and ped...

RoSPA marks World Day for Safety and Health at Work

26.04.13: Sunday, April 28 is Workers’ Memorial Day, when people are urged to reflect and remember the thousands of lives lost or affected by workplace accidents and ill-health, and also World Day for Safety and Health at Work. The Royal Societ...

Single framework for child protection and looked-after children

15.04.13: Plans to separate inspections for child protection and looked-after children are to be scrapped, Ofsted has announced. These services will now be inspected under a single, combined framework. Multi-agency inspections – planned to laun...

First aid in the workplace - What the public sector needs to know

01.04.13: Richard Evens, commercial training director at St John Ambulance, discusses the importance of first aid training to the public sector. Any organisation today – regardless of whether public or private sector – has a responsibilit...

Data collection on parents with mental health issues should be mandatory

25.03.13: Children whose parents or carers have serious mental health problems can sometimes be poorly provided for and left at risk, a new report suggests. ‘What about the children?’ a joint report by Ofsted and the Care Quality Commissi...

Lin Homer lambasted for UKBA failure

25.03.13: MPs have launched a severe attack against Lin Homer’s “catastrophic leadership failure” at the UK Border Agency (UKBA). Homer was promoted to chief executive of the HMRC last January – a move MPs on the Home Affairs...

Council road safety league table launched

22.03.13: A new road safety comparison site will allow residents to see how their local authority ranks against others, road safety minister Stephen Hammond has announced. The DfT has launched the website under obligation from the Strategic Framework...

HMRC customer service ‘abysmal’ – PAC

18.03.13: The HMRC has cost callers £136m last year through unanswered calls, the Commons Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has reported. 20 million calls went unanswered last year and the HMRC only replied to 66% of letters within 15 days, below...

Press regulation deal reached

18.03.13: A deal has been reached on press regulation, Labour’s deputy leader Harriet Harman has said. It comes after talks overnight between the three main parties at Westminster, and full details are expected to be published later today. Prim...

‘Significant misstatement of assets’ in DCMS accounts – NAO

26.02.13: Head of the National Audit Office Amyas Morse, the comptroller and auditor general, has refused to fully sign off the 2011-12 accounts for the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS). The audit opinion was qualified because the DCMS...

West Coast fiasco will cost ‘far more than £50m’ – Hodge

26.02.13: Another high-profile committee of MPs has attacked the way the West Coast Main Line franchise was awarded and blamed a “complete lack of common sense” among senior officials at the Department for Transport. Civil servants were b...

Health and safety distinction for 38 companies

21.02.13: The winners of the British Safety Council’s 2013 International Safety Awards have been announced, with 38 organisations awarded a distinction of their health and safety. Applicants answered 12 questions about the companies health and...

Iceland boss blames councils for horsemeat fiasco

18.02.13: Local authorities and public sector bodies are driving down food quality by using the cheapest possible food contracts for schools and hospitals, according to Iceland boss Malcolm Walker. The supermarket chain is among those which have had...

26% of home care services fail to meet standards – CQC

13.02.13: A quarter of home care services are failing to meet quality and safety standards, a new report suggests. The CQC reviewed 250 services against five key national standards. The CQC found that on many occasions people received no prior notice...