Childcare can make it more cost effective for some parents to give up work and stay at home, says an annual survey of family finances.

Italy receives a stern warning from the head of the European Central Bank to stick to its austerity plan after it fails to pass key measures.

Gordon's Brown's final years leading the Labour government were permanently in "chaos and crisis", says former chancellor Alistair Darling in his memoirs.

Former chancellor Alistair Darling felt that the governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King, did not fully grasp the UK's financial crisis, he says.