News

"Shadow" body takes shape ahead of next year's move to centralise ownership of government estate and charge departments market-level rent

Latest government commercial standards focus on building in-house clout and ask departments to justify use of interims

Microsoft's Natalia Boldyreva looks at how Office 365 can fundamentally transform how government work gets done

David Cameron’s policy guru ruminates on his career over lunch with CSW's Suzannah Brecknell

Public Accounts Committee move follows National Audit Office concerns over £434m “private sector support” and other costs in annual accounts

Appointment will bring number of female permanent secretaries to five, partially reversing recent downturn

Union research shows Grade 6 staff have seen a 16% pay cut in take-home pay since 2011, amid warnings that rises at lower grades will fail to keep pace with the National Living Wage

After a career in journalism spanning the Financial Times, The Times and Prospect, Bronwen Maddox has taken the helm of the Institute for Government. She tells Jess Bowie about her vision for the IfG’s future – and spills the beans on dinner with Russian president Vladimir Putin

"We need to go back, we need to re-plan, we need to be realistic, we can't do it all", says civil service chief executive

Work and Pensions Committee says Work Coaches should be supported "to strike the right balance between coaching and conditionality", and warns of varying management quality across the Jobcentre Plus network

"We’re forever doing accountability ex-post," says the former cabinet secretary, as MPs kick off their new inquiry into the future of the civil service

Reaching an agreement on thorny issues like redundancy pay is never easy – but it’s always better than the alternative

The drive to achieve greater consistency in the relationships between departments and ALBs is welcome, says Chris Banks of the Public Chairs' Forum – but it's time to move away from the "parent-child" model

Making a success of Brexit does not mean UK should ditch its reputation as a "free, tolerant, outward facing society", says former Foreign Office permanent secretary

A new resource from the Centre for Public Impact rates the effectiveness of policy initiatives from around the world. Mark Smulian reports

New appointments in the civil service, UK politics, and public affairs, via our colleagues on Dods People

Director general for defence and intelligence Sarah MacIntosh to take up posting next year

As well as leading the Ministry of Justice through a time of immense challenge and change, Richard Heaton is also busy trying to break down the barriers holding back black and minority ethnic civil servants. He tells Suzannah Brecknell why he’s optimistic about the future. Photos: Paul Heartfield

Constitutional expert and Whitehall historian Lord Hennessy says work must begin now for an official history of the UK’s exit from the European Union

BME officials "need to be part of the decision-making process", says Civil Service Race Forum chair Rob Neil, as he warns that meritocracy remains a "dream" for too many staff

Institute for Government says ruling on Parliamentary approval for Article 50 trigger will “greatly impact” Theresa May’s plans to enact leave mechanism by March 2017

Cabinet secretary seeks to take on claims that the civil service was biased in the EU referendum campaign and under-prepared in the aftermath of the vote

Iraq inquiry chair tells MPs that senior officials must "insist on their right to be heard and to record what their advice is" if they are to learn the lessons of the Iraq invasion

The UK in a Changing Europe​ says there will be "tensions if there is any further bifurcation of salaries in Whitehall" as a result of the drive to recruit specialists for Britain's EU exit. Meanwhile, Cabinet Office confirms Brexit-focused civil service-wide resource review is starting with the Senior civil Service