tweets:, external "I like having a ding-dong with you. You can grill me as hot as you like," PM tells LBC's Shelagh Fogarty. Is he feeling alright?

House of Commons
Parliament

David Anderson, the Labour MP for Blaydon, is the latest opposition backbencher to attack Francis Maude. "This is nothing more than an attempt to find a bogeyman which this party has tried to find for the last five years," he says. "They want another Arthur Scargill so they can try and rattle the can in the next few weeks. That is what this is all about." Mr Maude replies: "For a statement that members on the other side don't think should take place they're finding a lot to say about it."

tweets:, external Cameron on Syria girls: "Britain is amazing. You can come from anywhere and make it to the top - why would anyone want to give that up?"

BBC Radio 4

Shadow health secretary Andy Burnham says it's something of a contradiction for the government to be championing its plans for integration while at the same time "fragmenting" the NHS by bringing in more and more private providers. He says Labour is committed to creating a merged health and social care service and has identified money, from a mansion tax, to pay for it.

House of Commons
Parliament

The civil service statement is far more partisan than Eric Pickles' on troubled families that came before it. Conservative MP Charlie Elphicke raises the possibility of a merger between the PCS union - which isn't linked with Labour - and Unite, which very much is. "The perception of political impartiality in the civil service is fundamental to our system of government and that should not be imperilled in any way," Francis Maude says.

House of Commons
Parliament

Lucy Powell, shadow Cabinet Office minister, tells Francis Maude across the despatch box that the government's approach is driven by "political ideology rather than good accounting". She says "this is another stage in the long campaign to weaken trade unions and disenfranchise their members" - a remark which prompts dissent from the government benches. But Mr Maude can't help but smile at her closing comments: "The secretary of state has come to this House with his Lynton Crosby route one election strategy - bash the unions and duck the leaders' debates. Hard-pressed public sector workers will see this for what it is and they know they deserve better than this."

BBC Radio 4

Dr Louise Irvine, of campaign group the National Health Action Party, is unimpressed with the health and social care integration plan, calling it "another top-down effort to reconfigure how we work". She tells the World at One it's unlikely to make things better for patients - and staff - because it won't do anything about two key problems currently damaging the NHS. Those, she says, are underfunding and privatisation.

tweets:, external Good to hear Francis Maude announcing that the taxpayer subsidy to trade unions in Whitehall has been cut by 75% since 2011 #TPAWin

House of Commons
Parliament

Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude has been making a statement in the Commons about trade unions in the civil service. He says over 200 civil servants were being paid to work full-time on union business. "Trade union facility time", he says, was a "staggering" £36m. This has now dropped to just £10m. All trade union representatives must spend at least half their time in their main civil service role, and paid leave to attend conferences has now been stopped.

tweets:, external Labour's Lucy Powell says Maude has come to the House in a 'union-bashing pre-election exercise', says statement 'nothing new'

tweets:, external Francis Maude announcing another attack on trade unions in the civil service in Parliament.

House of Commons
Parliament

Labour veteran Barry Sheerman raises today's news from Ofsted that child social care is "inadequate" or "requires improvement" in three-quarters of inspected local authorities in England. "Children are in danger because of local government cuts," Mr Sheerman complains. Eric Pickles is unimpressed by this line of questioning. "Given the shadow chancellor's made absolutely clear there's no additional money for local government," he says, Mr Sheerman's approach does look "rather hollow".

BBC Radio 4

The World at One is discussing the decision to integrate health and social care in 29 parts of England. Simon Stevens, chief executive of NHS England, says people currently "aren't getting the preventative care they need at home so they end up being passed from pillar to post, or being admitted as a hospital emergency when they didn't need to be".

He goes on: "This is not an administrative reorganisation. This is based on what groups of doctors, nurses, patients have themselves said represents the best way of delivering care."

Image source, PA

Downing Street has rejected the suggestion that military cuts have left Britain less able to stand up to Russia or the Islamic State. The prime minister's spokesman said in this lunchtime's post-cabinet lobby briefing: "If you look at the international community's response to Isil in Iraq, the UK is the second largest contributor to air strikes. With regard to ensuring that Nato has the right capabilities and the UK making its full contribution to that, you have the RAF Typhoons that are part of the air patrols in the Baltic, and in central and eastern Europe several thousand British troops taking part during this calendar year in Nato exercises in the same region."

House of Commons
Parliament

Labour MP Ann Coffey, whose report on child sexual exploitation (CSE) in Manchester saw her invited to the Downing Street summit on the issue last week, asks Eric Pickles whether preventing child abuse and CSE should be included in the outcomes used to measure success for the troubled families programme. The communities and local government secretary agrees. "You can't just deal with this through social services, through the benefit agency. You have to have different disciplines in the room," Mr Pickles says. "The same applies to CSE. Social work is very well set up and very good at dealing with CSE within the family. The problem is dealing with organised crime becomes that much more difficult."

House of Commons
Parliament

Eric Pickles, responding to Hilary Benn's questions about his statement on the troubled families programme, lands a partisan blow in his softly-spoken way. Before the troubled families programme, he says, "we were throwing money at this problem and it was achieving precisely nothing." All that has changed now, he adds. "It so happens it is cheaper but it's actually better. It's more caring, we're not throwing people away. We're not condemning them to a life on benefits."

Daily Politics
Live on BBC Two

As Gordon Brown limbers up for his last big Commons speech later, the topic of his adjournment debate is now being discussed on the Daily Politics. "Gordon Brown is really scaremongering about the prospects of a referendum," Matthew Elliott, chief executive of Business For Britain, says. He doesn't rate the ex-PM's warning in a Guardian article, external that the logic of an exit leads to a "North Korea" situation for Britain. Roland Rudd, chairman of Business For New Europe, disagrees. He says the car industry would be badly affected by a 'Brexit' and adds: "You have to have the implementation of the single market. We need to be able to appeal in business trading, and to create a level playing field you must have some regulation."

House of Commons
Parliament

The government has secured an additional £200m of funding to reach another 400,000 families between 2015 and 2020, the communities secretary said.

Daily Politics
Live on BBC Two

Stephen O'Brien, the former international development minister, is taking over from Labour peer Valerie Amos as under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs at the United Nations. Leaving Britain will be a "wrench", he tells the Daily Politics. "But the chance to do something at the UN at this level comes very rarely, and I look forward to that chance." There had been some speculation the job would go to ex-Health Secretary Andrew Lansley.

House of Commons
Parliament

Hilary Benn, shadow communities and local government secretary, says Labour supports the "important work of the troubled families programme". He says he wants to see the programme "go from strength to strength". Mr Benn points out Labour wanted the original priorities to be broadened and that the government accepted the need to do so.