The Conservative Party Conference started yesterday and you will be able to find us in the Freedom Zone. You don't need a conference pass to get into this area, which is just outside the secure zone in Bridgewater Hall. If you are in the Manchester area before Wednesday do come and... Read more...
Yesterday the Coalition announced it is to provide £250 million to enable local authorities across the UK to switch back to weekly bin collections. In June I wrote about our disappointment that the Conservatives had backtracked on their manifesto pledge to end to fortnightly collections. However, Local Government Secretary Eric... Read more...
There's some bad news if you are sick or are visiting a sick friend or relative in Goole. Northern Lincolnshire and Goole Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust has increased parking charges at Goole Hospital. Charges have risen this month by a massive 13.33%, and then will increase again next September by the... Read more...
Today the TaxPayers’ Alliance announces two new monthly awards to celebrate those in power who have sought to save – and waste – taxpayers’ money. The man, woman or organisation to be congratulated for saving public money will be named the TPA’s “Pin-Up of the Month”, whilst whoever is found... Read more...
Click here for a full local breakdown with data for every councilClick here for the complete press release The TaxPayers' Alliance today reveals that local councils have spent thousands of pounds of taxpayers' money on award ceremonies in the last financial year. The money went towards tickets, accommodation, travel and... Read more...
Below is a picture from the Sunday Mercury of a set of newly painted road markings in Loughborough. Don’t make much sense, do they? While this picture is amusing, and of the kind that is often sent round on email, I am left wondering why on earth Leicestershire Council have... Read more...
The Sunday Telegraph reported this week that the cost of a new Passport Agency computer system had rocketed, rising from an estimated £80-£100 million to a bill of £365 million. In response to a parliamentary question tabled by Eilidh Whiteford MP, Immigration Minister Damian Green insisted that rising costs were... Read more...
The York Press reported this week that two of the five planning officers at York City Council have been released to do full-time union duties. Mike Slater, assistant director for planning and sustainable development said the council had a statutory duty to release union reps for duties, and other members... Read more...
Good news from Cornwall - councillors are listening to local residents and shopkeepers and are planning to reduce the cost of parking in some council car parks. The chairman of Cornwall’s parking advisory panel has told Helston residents that he is recommending the reduction of council parking fees to just... Read more...
Prisoners in Wales are alleging their human rights have been violated - not due to vermin or filth, but because they only have access to Sky Sports 1. That’s right, this week it was publicised that a group of Welsh prisoners are threatening legal action if Sky Sports 2 and... Read more...
The council is transforming the way it delivers public services. This is the first line of the job advert for Newham Borough Council's Change Project Portfolio Manager. Paying a salary of £43,368 per annum, the new recruit "will have overall responsibility for the integrity and coherence of the change projects... Read more...
In Let them eat carbon I looked at some of the problems we already knew about with the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). The idea is that sometimes it will be cheaper for richer countries like us to pay poorer countries to cut emissions on our behalf. It doesn't matter to... Read more...
On 7 September, councillors met in Leeds to debate the following motion, placed before them by Cllr Alan Lamb:‘This Council understands and recognises the valuable role played by Trades Unions in ensuring effective industrial relations and reaffirms the principle of providing reasonable support to Trades Unions including time off for... Read more...
Nile Gardiner at the Heritage Foundation has written for the Telegraph blog about the strong statement that the Government had to make at the United Nations in New York last week. In response to Argentina’s “increasingly belligerent stance”, as Nile puts it, the British delegation stated that we remain “fully... Read more...
Earlier this year the TaxPayers’ Alliance uncovered details of the Royal Mail surplus staff scheme. It costs taxpayers almost £10 million a year to retain employees rather than make them redundant. This note reveals that Transport for London has a similar arrangement called the “redeployment unit”.Click here to read the... Read more...
The TPA has discovered that Transport for London (TfL) has been paying the salaries of dozens of staff that have been languishing in a ‘Redeployment Unit’. The unit is for employees who have no formal role but are being kept on, rather than made redundant. The approximate cost of paying... Read more...
Micro-blogging website Twitter is to set up a new HQ in Dublin and I’m willing to bet that it’s not because they love Guinness. Ireland’s attractive 12.5 per cent corporate tax rate is bound to have been a big sweetener for the firm, which has been valued at upwards of... Read more...
Ed Balls rightly pointed out that the Coalition isn’t doing enough to create the conditions for growth in his speech to the Labour Party conference in Liverpool yesterday. However, his five-point plan for growth failed to meet the challenge he identified. The shadow chancellor proposed five measures aimed at boosting... Read more...
The BBC spent more than £8 million on consultants in 2010-11 despite huge cuts to programming and job losses. Figures obtained by the Telegraph under Freedom of Information laws reveal the extent to which the BBC indulged in advice estimated to be the equivalent of producing one of their flagship... Read more...
Ordnance Survey bureaucrats spent £8.7 million on government credit cards, research by Charlie Elphicke MP has revealed in The Sunday Times (£). Read more...
TPA supporter, Oliver Johnston, reflects on the election results in the East Riding of Yorkshire earlier this year, and on what the future holds for democracy in the county.Vox populi, vox dei. But only if it is heard. If the people have spoken, are these really the results that they... Read more...
Waltham Forest Council have spent £15,000 taking a company to court after a cardboard box bearing its name was found among fly-tipped rubbish. The boxes had been given to a passer-by who said he could make use of them. However, one ended up being dumped and the council wasted little... Read more...
In June, I wrote how Hull City Council was storing up problems for the future. I said then it looked like there was going to be a £6 million overspend that would need to be plugged. Figures out this week have proved I was correct. The latest forecasts indicate the... Read more...
Following Liz Holiday's earlier post, as some of the half-billion pound ‘white elephant’ FiReControl Project control centres are in the South-West, it is well worth looking at the government report itself to see the detail of the government mess-up. 'No one has been held to account for this project failure,’ concluded Margaret... Read more...