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Lisa Nandy MP today expressed concern that the civil service fast stream programme was not accessible to a diverse talent pool.

The think tank The Centre for London has called for greater fiscal power and power over services to be transferred from Whitehall to City Hall.

Almost two thirds (65%) of civil servants have suffered from ill health as a result of stress at work, one fifth (19%) of which have taken more than 40 days off within a 12 month period as a result of stress-related ill health, new surveys from the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union reveal. 

Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg set out new measures to help public sector workers streamline their workload, improve mental wellbeing and share parental leave with partners. 

Fathers in the civil service will receive the same parental leave as mothers from April 2015, Nick Clegg will announce this week.

Tens of thousands joined the Trades Union Congress (TUC) organised march that took place in major cities across the UK on Saturday, 18 October to protest against pay conditions. 

The Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) has announced plans to start recruiting for the roles of pensions ombudsman and deputy pensions ombudsman for 2015.

HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) has announced plans to further reduce the number of staff and offices in a bid to reduce the size and number of locations used by the department.

Permanent secretaries have less than a month to deliver work to boost diversity in their departments, the government’s new diversity champion Sir Simon Fraser revealed at this year’s Civil Service Diversity & Equality Awards.

The shortlist of civil servants nominated for the 2014 Civil Service Awards, held in collaboration with the Cabinet Office, was announced today.

Civil servants from UK government departments and agencies as well as the Welsh government have today joined a national walk-out over pay.

The prime minister will be able to pick permanent secretaries out of a candidate shortlist from December this year, under new rules announced today – with the first competition to be held under the new process that to replace Sir Bob Kerslake in February as permanent secretary of the Department for Communities and Local Government.

The civil service has not gone far enough in appointing women to senior positions, the Treasury’s second permanent secretary Sharon White told a conference audience last month.

This year’s civil service Diversity and Equality Award winners have been named at a ceremony in Petty France today.

The Tories will continue Whitehall cuts at the same pace for at least two further years if re-elected for another term in office, chancellor George Osborne has announced today.

HM Passport Office will be abolished and its operations absorbed by the Home Office from 1 October, it has been announced today, and the organisation’s chief executive Paul Pugh will be replaced by a newly-appointed director general.

There is “unfinished business” in civil service reform, former head of the civil service Sir Bob Kerslake said yesterday – including devolving powers away from Whitehall, and breaking down departmental structures. 

Civil servants are due to take part in a one-day strike over pay on Wednesday, 15 October, it has been announced today.

Former head of the civil service Sir Bob Kerslake has said his biggest regret is that the government didn’t publish a civil service diversity plan more quickly.

Oliver Robbins, director-general, civil service, has spoken out in defence of the government’s new Talent Action Plan – designed to promote diversity in the civil service – after a blog about its publication attracted 130 comments on the civil service website.

A total of 200 18-21-year-olds are this week starting the government’s civil service Fast Track apprenticeship scheme.

Senior civil servants often “don’t know what’s going on” with contracts held by their departments and thus spot problems too late, Joshua Reddaway, the National Audit Office’s director for commercial and contracting, has warned.

Paul Pugh, chief executive of the Passport Office, has been accused of a “complete management failure” by the Home Affairs Select Committee. In a report published today, the committee calls for the office to be abolished and its functions to be returned to the direct control of ministers.