More than 80% of people in Scotland know at least two friends who have experienced mental distress, research suggests. The Mental Health Foundation research also revealed many people did not want to admit their problems to friends for fear of what they would think.

Care services for almost 15,000 vulnerable people across Scotland are in doubt because of cash problems facing voluntary organisations. A report on charities providing care for 60,000 citizens, including the elderly and those with learning disabilities, has found that almost all of them have services which are underfunded.

Social workers allowed a sex offender to live with his alleged victim’s family while on bail, according to a secret report produced months after the same department failed to act on warnings that could have prevented the murder of a young woman.

The centuries-old legal taboo protecting the secrecy of the jury room should be broken to find out why jurors are so reluctant to convict men of rape, one of Scotland’s most senior lawyers said last night.

An investigation has been launched after surgical equipment was accidentally re-used at a hospital. NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde is conducting the investigation after equipment used in the mouth of one patient was kept and used to treat an infected wound in the mouth of another.

Scotland’s lost generation of young jobless people is costing the country £1.7bn every year as a result of crime, lost productivity and educational under-achievement, a report published yesterday claims.