Editor's Comment

Take a moment to celebrate

25.10.17: Devolution, restructuring and widespread service reform: from a journalist’s perspective, it’s never been a more exciting time to report on the public sector. That’s why I could not be more thrilled to be taking over the reins...

Time for reflection

14.08.17: A lot has happened since the last edition of PSE was published. In particular, the snap general election delivered an astounding result that many of the pollsters and political experts could not have predicted when Theresa May initially called f...

Challenges remain

15.06.17: As PSE went to press, we were days away from finding out which political party or parties would be leading the country following Theresa May’s decision to call a snap general election for 8 June.  Whoever enters the door at No.10...

A watershed moment in British politics

11.04.17: The government has now officially triggered Article 50, formally starting the process of Britain’s exit from the EU. How this will affect local government, the wider public sector and the Civil Service remains to be seen, but the likelihoo...

Untapped potential

21.02.17: As PSE went to press, the government had just released its Industrial Strategy green paper, which has an ambitious aim to “improve living standards and economic growth by increasing productivity and driving growth across the whole country&...

No early Christmas presents

20.12.16: As the chancellor stood at the despatch box in late November, the public sector waited with bated breath at what support would be given to those that are working under extreme pressure. Unfortunately, but not unexpectedly, Philip Hammond didn&rs...

Clarity still needed on direction of travel

19.10.16: As the party conference season came to a close, the sector still wasn’t any clearer on the direction of travel for devolution and local government reform.  Instead, like last year, it appears that the chancellor’s Autumn St...

A new wave of uncertainty

19.08.16: Since the last edition of PSE, the landscape facing the public sector has altered dramatically and brought with it a great deal of uncertainty – as if there wasn’t enough of that before.  Following the UK’s vote to le...

Devolution: we are where we are

01.06.16: Despite the process for English devolution being criticised as ‘piecemeal’ and lacking ‘clear objectives’, we are now starting to see the transfer of some powers and budgetary control from Whitehall to Town Halls.  ...

Weather warning

01.02.16: This edition of PSE goes to press just as Storm Imogen begins to subside. This latest barrage of winter weather caused yet more disruption to transport and power networks, but thankfully less permanent damage than earlier storms in late 2015 and...

Public notice

01.12.15: As PSE was going to press, we were still awaiting the local government financial settlement. This has rarely made for happy reading in recent years.  With the number of rabbits-pulled-out-of-hats that George Osborne managed in the Spen...

Money and power

13.10.15: Our front cover photograph gets across well some of the key themes we’re covering in this edition, showing as it does protesters marching past Manchester Town Hall – austerity, devolution and public service reform. The marchers...

Power levels

19.08.15: PSE has long been supportive of the ‘Keep it Local’ campaign, run by Locality – the membership body for community organisations. The thrust of the campaign is that some ‘common sense’ ideas actually have pernicious...

A new start, a fresh outlook

01.02.15: As you will have seen, Public Sector Executive has undergone an extensive redesign to improve the look and feel of the magazine, to signpost readers to our articles more easily and to make our content as attractive and engaging as possible. ...

Trust in town halls

13.12.14: George Osborne said something interesting during his Autumn Statement. “Six months ago people would have said it was completely impossible to get the 10 local authorities of Greater Manchester to come together with the government to agree...