The North would have to slash its spending if the Ulster Unionists’ new electoral partners were in power, it was warned today.

A fuel credit plan worth £15m (€16.67m) will cut the electricity bills of thousands of households in the North this winter, it was announced today.

Civil servants who work for the Department of Social Development in the North are off sick for almost four weeks a year on average, according to a public spending watchdog.

A benefit fraudster was jailed for nine months today and ordered to hand over more than £120,000 (€178,000)under a confiscation order.

A wide-ranging Welfare Reform Bill is to be rushed through the Northern Assembly today.

Controversial neighbourhood justice schemes in the North should be vetted to prevent people with criminal or paramilitary links since 1998 working in them, a committee of MPs urged today.

The British government was today urged to come up with an education strategy for all ages in loyalist areas of Belfast.

Twenty-four-hour drinking in Northern Ireland pubs could be introduced within two years it was revealed today – as an addiction expert warned of round-the-clock binge dangers.

The British government moved today to address the problems of disadvantaged loyalist communities in Belfast.

HUNDREDS of elderly people in the North are dying every year from living in cold conditions because of the British Government’s inaction, it was claimed yesterday.

The Northern Ireland Housing Executive is to work on two pilot projects for integrated housing, it confirmed today.

A public service union tonight announced an intensification of its civil service strike action in Northern Ireland in a dispute over pay.

Northern Ireland’s Equality Commission was today urged to probe claims that a British government department squandered almost £55m (€77m) in European Union funds for disadvantaged communities affected by the Troubles.

The bomb-ravaged town of Omagh received a major boost today with the launch of a new £9.1m arts centre and riverside regeneration scheme.