The number of girls and young women drinking to excess has risen dramatically in a decade, NHS statistics released yesterday confirm. The figures chart the rise of the “ladette” culture, which emerged in the 1990s.

The Home Office is being forced to bring a family of failed asylum seekers it deported months ago back to Britain and pay them compensation. A judge ordered John Reid’s department to find the bogus refugees and bring them back – even though they are likely to be thrown out again. The bill for the whole exercise will be footed by the taxpayer.

A website has been set up by a watchdog to allow patients see how private and voluntary hospitals and health providers are performing. The Healthcare Commission service allows people to run postcode searches for private centres to see how they are doing in meeting 32 core standards.

A charity was criticised today after allowing a killer who worked for the Duchess of York to design its Christmas card. Social welfare charity Miracles, which offers “crisis funding, positive thinking and practical support to those with nowhere else to turn”, invited Jane Andrews to come up with the image.

Skills for Care’s national annual conference will take place at the East Midlands Conference Centre in Nottingham on February 27 – 28 2007. The theme this year is partnerships.

A former vicar and an “evil” paedophile rights campaigner were jailed today after a massive “Aladdin’s Cave” of child porn was found in a country mansion. {mosimage}The sickening library of

The girlfriend of the latest Suffolk Strangler suspect wept as she declared: “He’s innocent.” Former QE2 chef Steve Wright, 48, was arrested in a dawn raid on his home in Ipswich’s red light district, where he is said to have regularly taken prostitutes.

{mosimage}The fork-lift truck driver, a twice-divorced father of one, was held less than 24 hours after the first suspect, Tom Stephens, 37, was also arrested over the murders of five prostitutes.

Wright was led from his flat wearing his dressing gown. His blue Ford Mondeo was taken away for inspection by police as a team of forensic officers combed his flat for possible clues.

Police described the arrest as “significant”.

Wright’s partner of five years, Pamela Goodman, emerged from a police station in tears after being briefly allowed to see him.

“Steve is innocent and I am confident that the police now know that none of this is true,” she told a close friend. “I can provide alibis for him when he is supposed to have killed those women.”

London’s Underground system remains wide open to terrorist attack because the Government has been hugely complacent about safety, the Tories have warned.

Cornwall County Council is acting to reduce the number of people currently waiting to be transferred from acute hospitals by spending more than £500,000 on funding beds in care homes and community hospitals. The authority has agreed to spend £529,000 funding placements for 120 people currently blocking hospital beds in the county.

A new scheme aimed at protecting victims of domestic violence is set to be unveiled by ministers. The “sanctuary scheme” will provide money to create a room in which women