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General Reports and Other Publications
TUC: Rising financial profits have reduced workers' wages and squeezed profits across the rest of the economy, according to a new TUC report. The TUC touchstone extra report - Where have all the wages gone? - examines why salaries have been falling for the last 30 years, where the money has gone & what this means for the economy.
ESRC: The health benefits of 'water clubs' in care homes for the elderly, where residents gather together regularly to drink water, owe as least as much to the social nature of the activity as to the value of drinking water itself, an investigation by psychologists has shown.
The study, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), supports other findings that interventions aimed at improving individuals' wellbeing & quality of life can be far more effective if they are carried out among groups of people in ways that generate a strong sense of group identity.
IfL: The Institute for Learning (IfL) has said that a new report published by the City & Guilds Centre for Skills Development (CSD) will be a central addition to the current debate on effective vocational pedagogy.
CH: Fluctuating prices will create chaotic chain reactions unless governments & businesses get to grips with a new world order defined by resource politics, says Resources Futures, a new report. Mutually destructive trade policies and an ever more unpredictable global environment will add to the cocktail of resource-related fears.
Resources Futures shows that in an interconnected world, volatile prices pose far greater threats than physical scarcities. Shocks reverberate across supply chains when communities protest in Peru, rainfall levels drop in the American Midwest, or a flood hits Australia – often sending global resource markets into a tailspin.
Press release & links
Resources Futures shows that in an interconnected world, volatile prices pose far greater threats than physical scarcities. Shocks reverberate across supply chains when communities protest in Peru, rainfall levels drop in the American Midwest, or a flood hits Australia – often sending global resource markets into a tailspin.
Press release & links
NLGN: A new report from New Local Government Network & CBI reveals that conversations between councils & independent providers of public services are stuck in low gear. This creates a risk that councils will not be able to access the innovative new partnerships they need to manage growing demand, spending cuts and changing social needs.
A plan for this sophisticated commissioning approach is outlined in the report ‘Commissioning Dialogues’, which takes the form of an open & holistic dialogue between local government & providers, of which formal procurement is just one stage.
PC&PE: The Commons Transport Committee has published a follow up report on the Coastguard, Emergency Towing Vessels and the Maritime Incident Response Group. Confusion about the role of the new national Maritime Operations Centre (MOC) and mixed messages about local knowledge & coastguard station closures has undermined staff morale across the service and caused an alarming vacancy rate amongst skilled staff, warns the Transport Committee in a review of the government's reform programme for the Coastguard which found that coastguards are ‘disillusioned and confused’.
TWF: A report published by The Work Foundation warns that a lack of positive practice to support people with musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) in work is leaving hundreds of thousands at risk of lost earnings, reduced productive working time and early retirement, with an accompanying strain on both household incomes and the UK welfare system.
Launched as part of the Fit for Work Coalition UK, Taking the strain: the impact of musculoskeletal disorders on work & home lifedraws on a survey 809 people living with MSDs in the UK.
PC&PE: The Joint Committee on the Draft Communications Data Bill has published a report that says the Draft Bill must be 'significantly amended' to deliver only necessary data that law enforcement needs and that the Home Secretary should not be given carte blanche to order retention of any type of data under draft communications data bill.
NAO: A report by the National Audit Office has found that regulation of the consumer credit market is providing benefits to consumers, but that the regulatory regime is not delivering value for money because it is not minimizing harm from unscrupulous trading practices.
IPPR: The new ‘Energy Company Obligation’ (ECO) scheme will only scratch the surface of Britain’s fuel poverty problem and may see the Government backslide on its carbon reduction commitments, according to a new report from the think tank IPPR.
WAG: The Deputy Minister for Agriculture, Alun Davies, has welcomed a new report on securing a sustainable & prosperous future for the Welsh Uplands. He said he agreed in principle with the 6 recommendations of Unlocking the Potential of the Uplands.
PX: Foster carers should be able to request that a child in their care is sent to a state or independent boarding school. A new report, A Better Start in Life, by Policy Exchange says every year thousands of the most vulnerable children in the country are moved from one care placement to another. In some instances, children are being moved around the care system more than 10 times within a year.
By providing respite to foster carers & birth parents, boarding school could help keep families together, reducing the number of people entering the care system and reducing the likelihood of placement breakdown for those moving into care.
PC&PE: The Public Accounts Committee has published a report on the Ministry of Justice's language service contract. The Rt Hon Margaret Hodge MP, Chair of the CPA, recently said: "Interpretation services are vital for ensuring fair access to justice. Yet when the Ministry of Justice set out to establish a new centralised system for supplying interpreters to the justice system, almost everything that could go wrong did go wrong.”
TWF: Rising transport costs are making it difficult for thousands of young people to participate in education & training, leaving many unable to enter or stay in work, according to a new report from The Work Foundation.
This is particularly the case for young people living in rural areas who find it harder to stay in work due to inadequate public transport routes from their homes. The report calls on the government to implement policies that will reduce the transport barriers which exacerbate the youth unemployment crisis.
RUSI: Sovereign Wealth Recovery in failing or corrupt states should be incorporated in planning by political elites & force commanders ahead of any future military or other intervention to expedite a return to stability, according to a new research from the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI).
DECC: A report has found that significant changes to the retail market for road fuels, including the increasing dominance of supermarket forecourts, have not had an impact on the availability of petrol & diesel for motorists.
PC&PE: The Government’s plans to extend planning permission exemptions are based on an inadequate impact assessment, warns the CLG Committee in a report. By failing to take account of the social & environmental effects, the same proposals also ignore 2 essential requirements of the sustainable development policy set out in the National Policy Planning Framework, say the MPs.
PC&PE: The Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards has published its first report. The report contains the Commission’s consideration of the Government’s draft Financial Services (Banking Reform) Bill and associated proposals which give effect to the recommendations of the Independent Commission on Banking (ICB).
PC&PE: The House of Lords Committee on Adoption Legislation has called on the Government to widen the scope of a proposed new adoption measure. The Government’s proposed ‘fostering for adoption’ duty is designed to encourage councils to place looked after children with foster carers who can then go on to adopt them, providing continuity & stability.
The Committee also report on the Government’s proposal to remove any requirement to give consideration to ethnicity when placing a child with adopters. The Committee does not find that this is necessary but recommends an alternative amendment to the legislation which accords ethnicity an equal place within the list of the child’s needs and characteristics.
PC&PE: The Public Accounts Committee has published its findings on British Broadcasting Corporation: The severance payment awarded to the BBC's former Director General. The Rt Hon Margaret Hodge MP, Chair of the CPA, said: "Public servants should not be rewarded for failure. But that was exactly what happened when the BBC Trust paid off the former Director General, George Entwistle”.
PC&PE: The Education Committee has welcomed the overall direction of the Government’s proposed legislation to reform provision for children with special educational needs (SEN), but warns that the NHS Constitution cannot be allowed to prevent the imposition of much stronger duties on commissioning boards to ensure that adequate, joined-up services are put in place across the country.
PC&PE: The Energy and Climate Change Committee has published its report into Consumer engagement with energy markets.
IEA: For too long the government has been pushing up living costs through over-regulation & taxation. The poverty lobby has failed to tackle this basic cause of poverty in the UK, instead focusing on redistribution through the welfare system.
A new report from the IEA shows that by eliminating government interventions in areas such as planning, energy markets & childcare; living costs can be reduced dramatically, taxes could be cut, and the welfare state could be reformed to meaningfully address poverty in Britain.
The research in Redefining the Poverty Debate: Why a War on Markets is No Substitute for a War on Poverty, estimates that these reforms could make some families up to £750 a month better off.
The research in Redefining the Poverty Debate: Why a War on Markets is No Substitute for a War on Poverty, estimates that these reforms could make some families up to £750 a month better off.
PC&PE: The Environmental Audit Committee has published the report of its inquiry into the Energy Intensive Industries Compensation Scheme. The Government's £250m compensation scheme to help energy intensive companies with the cost of carbon must be tightened up to avoid over-compensating large companies already profiting from the over allocation of EU Emissions Trading System allowances.
DfE: Children who have speech, language & communication needs should be helped as soon as possible, new research has concluded. The Better Communication Research Programme makes 3 main recommendations and also recommends that data guidance on special educational needs for schools should be reviewed. This would be to encourage teachers to focus on children’s individual profile of needs, rather solely on labels when deciding on what support to provide.
DH: People want to see tighter restrictions around the cosmetic surgery industry in a bid to protect patients from some of the more aggressive sales techniques according to an interim report published by the NHS Medical Director, Sir Bruce Keogh’s review into cosmetic interventions.
