A combination of rising costs, frozen budgets and a new method for distributing government funding is set to leave north east schools struggling to provide high standards of education.
Schools may be forced to sack teachers, class sizes could increase and schools may no longer be able to offer certain...
Newcastle City Council has announced that, due to the government’s ongoing austerity policies, it will have to raise council tax and slash services.
In a meeting on Wednesday, councillors discussed then voted to approve a report that proposed making £30 million of savings in the coming financial year and £70...
Newcastle United hero Alan Shearer is to undergo a series of dementia tests as part of an upcoming BBC documentary.
In Dementia – Football’s Silent Shame, Mr Shearer will investigate whether years spent heading footballs make ex-soccer professionals more likely to suffer from the condition.
It is suspected that brain damage...
A 68-year-old north-east poet has been announced as the winner of The Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry 2016. Gillian Allnutt, who has strong connections with Tyneside and County Durham, will receive the award from the Queen in a ceremony to be held later this year.
The Gold Medal for Poetry...
A group of cross-party MPs sitting on the Commons Public Accounts Committee has found that benefit sanctions can vary a great deal depending on which part of the country claimants live in and which private company is responsible for getting them into work.
The MPs – which include Bridget Phillipson,...
A cruise ship company sailing out of the Port of Tyne has hit upon a novel way to entertain its guests. This September will see the ship Magellan embarking for a water-borne rock festival entitled Rock the Boat 2017.
Cruise ship firm Cruiseco hopes its idea will appeal to rock...
A jobcentre manager from Newcastle has criticised Ken Loach’s popular recent film I, Daniel Blake. Steve McCall, employer relationship manager at Jobcentre Plus in Tyne and Wear and Northumberland, said, “I hope people don’t think the film is a documentary because it’s a story that doesn’t represent the reality...
Do you know that a survey last year ranked Newcastle as the happiest city in the UK? And not only that, the Toon also came in as the tenth happiest city in the whole of Europe.
A European Commission survey, whose results were published in 2016, drew these conclusions after...
Nick Forbes, the leader of Newcastle City Council, could soon be enjoying a significant pay rise. Newcastle’s Independent Remuneration Panel has proposed an increase that would take Cllr Forbes’s allowance to £36,000 per year.
While there are many in the public and private sectors that earn a lot more than...
A poet from the north east has won a prestigious literary prize. Jacob Polley, a Newcastle lecturer, clinched the prize for his collection Jackself, a disturbing work about the loss of innocence.
After reading many manuscripts and months of deliberation, the three judges chose Mr Polley’s collection from a shortlist...
