Sickness absence has fallen again, with six million fewer days lost last year compared to 2010, official figures have shown.

About 131 million working days were lost in 2011 at an average of four-and-a-half days per worker, said the Office for National Statistics. The figures compared with 178 million lost days in 1993, when records began, at an average of more than seven days per employee.

Government plans to withdraw child benefit from parents earning more than £50,000 are "seriously flawed in principle and in practice", and threaten public confidence in the tax system, the official accountants' body has warned.

Just months before the scheduled introduction of the changes next January, the Institute of Chartered Accountants for England and Wales (ICAEW) urged the Treasury to rethink its plans or risk "an operational and reputational disaster for the Government and HM Revenue and Customs" (HMRC).

A rail firm has been accused of planning to make £1.25 million a year in profits from closing ticket offices and cutting jobs.

The Rail Maritime and Transport union (RMT) said London Midland was "blazing a trail" for cuts included in the recent McNulty review into the future of the rail industry, which the Government is currently considering.

Ministers must demonstrate they have properly accounted for risks in their Work Programme after getting the scheme off the ground in just a year, a group of MPs have said.

The Public Accounts Committee said getting the project up and running quickly was "commendable" but there were risks to taxpayers' money because there was no pilot and an IT system designed to detect fraud was not ready at launch.

Water providers have come under increased pressure from the industry watchdog to ensure drought-stricken areas are helped by regions with more plentiful supplies.

The impact of recent weather - flooding in a time of drought - is one of the major long-term issues water suppliers have to tackle, Ofwat warned, as it unveiled guidelines for how it intends to set tariff limits between 2015 and 2020.

Motorists could face a 50% rise in fuel duty in future years to cover a £13 billion hole in Treasury coffers, according to a report.

The gap in public finances will come from increasing use of more fuel-efficient cars and a switch to electric vehicles, the RAC Foundation-commissioned report said.

The number of men doing part-time work because they cannot find a full-time job has more than doubled in the last four years, according to a new study.

The TUC said almost 600,000 men were working part-time in December while looking for full-time positions, compared to 293,000 at the end of 2007.

Parents are to be given new rights to buy help for children with special needs under the biggest shake-up of the system for 30 years, it has been confirmed.

Under the plans, families will be given legal powers to control budgets for youngsters who need support.

Energy giant E.ON has reassured its five million customers after it pledged to keep residential energy prices on hold this year.

E.ON's pledge came after British Gas owner Centrica last week signalled that further price hikes were on the way as its costs continued to mount.

The error-strewn accounts of the organisation in charge of enforcing child maintenance payments have not been fully signed off by a Government spending watchdog.

Some maintenance payments at the Child Maintenance and Enforcement Commission (CMEC) were based on incorrect assessments and some were paid at the wrong rate, according to the National Audit Office (NAO).