GPs could prescribe air conditioning and child anger management classes under an £8.9m government scheme. Under the plans, the NHS could pay for air conditioning to be fitted to the homes of people with lung disease to improve their health in hot weather. And anger management classes would be given to children with behavioural problems.

Most foster carers in the UK are receiving either no payment at all or less than the minimum wage in return for caring for damaged and vulnerable young people, according to a survey out today.

Gordon Lishman, Director General of Age Concern, said: “We welcome today’s statement by Patricia Hewitt and Ruth Kelly. It is certainly a step in the right direction. Focusing on prevention, looking at the entire needs of older people and improved coordination between social services and the NHS is the only way forward for care.

The maximum wait for NHS hearing tests is to be slashed from more than two years to less than two months, as new technology is introduced to accelerate fitting of digital aids for hundreds of thousands of older people, the government said yesterday.

The Department of Health is today launching a campaign to boost the number of people taking up a career in social care. The new campaign aims to attract applicants to the social care sector, which needs to attract thousands of new recruits each year.

Young children are failing to get a good education in half the nursery and primary classes for three to five year olds, school inspectors warn in a report today. They are making insufficient progress in language and literacy, the most able are not being challenged and boys are already falling behind girls, says Ofsted.

Most Foundation Stage settings provide effective education and care, according to a new Ofsted report, The Foundation Stage: a survey of 144 settings.  However, the quality of provision varies between them.

Babies who attend formal child care, such as day nurseries, at the tender age of nine months are better behaved and less likely to experience a wide range of developmental problems at the age of three than the average child, according to new Government-funded research today.

Whilst welcoming the overall direction of David Freud’s report, the Disability Rights Commission (DRC) warned that Government plans to increase the numbers of lone parents moving into paid employment still risked leaving out the quarter that have a disabled child.

Victoria Agoglia’s troubles began when her mother died when she was eight. She never knew her natural father and social services decided her stepfather was not fit to look after her so two years later she was placed in care and spent time in homes across Manchester.