Business and conservation groups should be able to "unite behind" revised planning rules for England, says Communities Secretary Eric Pickles.

US doctors have carried out what they say is the most extensive face transplant ever performed, by giving a man a new jaw, teeth and tongue.

Schools in England should be fined if pupils leave school with poor literacy skills, an independent report into last year's riots says.

The world's largest research databank for cleft lip and palate is being set up in the UK.

Playing music to patients while they go under the knife reduces their anxiety and may even improve healing, surgeons say.

A committee of peers concludes there is a need for a more diverse judiciary in England and Wales to improve public trust in the justice system.

A committee of MPs and peers recommends that bishops should remain members of a reformed House of Lords, but in reduced numbers.

Teachers and lecturers in London are staging a one-day strike in a dispute over pensions.