General Reports and Other Publications
Newswire – CPA: The Committee of Public Accounts has published a report on the youth justice system in England & Wales.
Newswire – Ho CC: A reduction in the time allowed for advertisements on commercial broadcasting channels has been called for by the House of Lords Communications Committee, who report that ‘existing regulation of the market is no longer relevant in the digital age and doesn’t serve the best interests of viewers’. The Committee feels that the Code on Scheduling of Television Advertising should be harmonised to level the playing field between public service & commercial broadcasters when Digital Switchover happens in 2012.
HEFCE: The Higher Education Funding Council Englandhas published 3 studies relating to flexible & innovative provision:
* 'Diverse provision in higher education: options and challenges'
* 'Costing study of accelerated two-year honours degrees: a report to HEFCE by Liz Hart Associates'
* 'Flexible Learning Pathfinders: key statistics 2008-09'
CSJ: The scrapping of the Supporting People programme by local authorities would be dangerous & counter-productive, according to leading independent think-tank the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ). The housing-related programme provides crucial support to over 800,000 older people and cutting its funding would ‘undermine the aspiration of effective & targeted social expenditure’. The programme provides a great example of one occasion when government has properly evaluated the impact of its expenditure.
CLG: Returning home from hospital after a fall, or facing the mountain of climbing a step when you are elderly can be daunting, but help through handypersons services can go a long way to reducing these worries. A new independent report commissioned by the Department for Communities and Local Government shows that handypersons services around the country are showing that they are value for money and help elderly people to carry on living in their own homes with confidence.
The report says handypersons services, can reduce the risk of injury or even death through preventing further falls, reducing risk of burglary or fire. These preventative services are cost effective, for example postponing entry into residential care can save up to £28,000 per year per person.
LGO: Barnsley Council raised the price of a narrow strip of land it had agreed to sell to a woman for her extension – effectively valuing a small triangle of land (7 inches at its widest point) at £4,000, finds Local Government Ombudsman, Anne Seex.
In her report, issued today (22 February 2011) she says the woman “…justifiably feels a strong sense of outrage that the Council should have exploited her situation to try to obtain what she describes as an ‘extortionate’ price.” She added that it was inconceivable that the Council could have obtained any value for the land from anyone else.
ScotGov: Housing & Communities Minister, Alex Neil, has commented on a recently published report from Save the Children regarding child poverty in the UK.
Press release ~ Severe Child Poverty: Nationally and locally ~ Save the Children: UK child poverty ~ Poorer families forced to pay more for heating and services
IISS: The International Institute for Strategic Studies has published a Strategic Comment on the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE)’s uncertain future, claiming that the credibility of the OSCE as a regional security provider is increasingly in doubt.
Press release and links
Newswire - LGA: Council leaders remain unconvinced of the Government’s commitment to ‘reducing the huge quantity of information local authorities have to collect & report to government departments each year’. The LGA has set out its concerns in a response to CLG’s Single Data List Consultation.
Press release ~ CLG’s Single Data List Consultation ~ Single Data List - LGA Response - Final - 20110214.pdf ~ Single Data List Response - Appendix - Draft 2.pdf ~ SINGLE DATA LIST principles final 110210.pdf
iea: New research released by the Institute of Economic Affairs calculates that £16bn could be saved per year by 2015/2016 if older people shared the cuts burden. In Sharing the burden – How the older generation should suffer its share of the cuts, the IEA looks at the savings that would be made if non-means-tested benefits to older people were cut and the state pension system were reformed.
Press release ~ Sharing the burden - how the older generation should suffer its share of the cuts ~ www.iea.org.uk.
IFS: The Institute for Fiscal Studies has published its analysis of the most recent public finance figures.
Press release and links
Newswire – AvMA: AvMA has published its latest report into implementation of patient safety alerts; "Too little too late?" Full implementation of all alerts by the deadline given is supposed to be mandatory, but ‘half of NHS trusts still have not complied with at least one alert’.
Press release and links
Newswire – HAC: The Commons Home Affairs Committee has published a short report on police finances, focusing on the impact of the Government’s proposed settlement for police forces from 2011-12 to 2014-15.
Press release and links
IISS: The International Institute for Strategic Studies has published a Strategic Comment on Russian navy's regeneration plans. A recent deal under which Russia will buy 4 Mistral naval ships from France is an important demonstration that Moscow is getting serious about building a modern navy.
CIPD: The temporary migration cap is hampering employers’ ability to hire skilled non-EU workers, says latest CIPD/KPMG labour market survey.
Press release and links
Newswire – TUC: A record 5.26m people worked unpaid overtime last year - the highest since records began in 1992 - a TUC analysis of official figures revealed last week to mark Work Your Proper Hour Day (WYPHD). They clocked up an average 7 hours 12 minutes unpaid overtime a week, worth £5,485 per person and a record £28.9bn to the economy.
Public sector workers are the most likely to do unpaid overtime, with 26.3% regularly putting in more than 7 hours of unpaid overtime a week, compared to around 18.9% in the private sector.
ippr: Revised figures on growth published last week should lead the Chancellor George Osborne to make his forthcoming Budget a budget for growth, according to a
Demos: The numbers of young people ‘not in education, employment or training’ published last week fails to accurately show the full extent of the youth unemployment crisis according to the think tank Demos. A forthcoming report exposes the inadequacy of level 1 & 2 NVQs that offer little or no protection from unemployment, and are shown to harm – rather than boost – young people’s earning potential.
The Forgotten Half, due to be published in March 2011, examines the paths of the 50% of young people who do not go to university. It finds poor support for young people in terms of career advice & qualifications to help them make the transition from school to work in an increasingly competitive job market.
The report will recommend waiving or reducing employer’s National Insurance contributions for workers under the age of 25 to get more young people into the workplace. Demos says the cost to the state would be rapidly made up by preventing young people moving onto unemployment benefits for long periods and mitigating the effect of a lost generation.
.png)
