Delegates at the Acpos annual drugs conference this week will be shown a DVD of boys in Polmont young offenders institute, describing the natural transition for them from binge drinking to taking cannabis and other drugs, including heroin and cocaine. For many of them, this was the reason they ended up behind bars.

Shetland is the best place in Scotland for old people who want to keep living in their own home, a survey has revealed. The London-based Chartered Society of Physiotherapy (CSP) found Shetland Islands Council helped more people stay at home than any other Scottish authority.

Up to 200 properties may be leased from private landlords to counter a “chronic shortage” of temporary council accommodation for homeless people in Perth and Kinross.

Silence has not been golden in the case of the Wade Centre. The vacuum that has existed since Highland Council revealed a year ago that the Kingussie facility would become a blueprint in the region for care for the elderly in the 21st Century has only increased anxiety among old and frail residents, their loved ones and health campaigners.

Free personal care, the flagship policy of devolution, continues to be a success COSLA President Pat Watters has said. Commenting as an independent evaluation of the policy was published Councillor Watters said: “This is a defining policy for Scotland and it is a policy that has been a tremendous success for Scotland’s elderly.

Thousands of children and retired people face losing youth clubs, support groups and other community services because of a cash crisis at a council-funded organisation. The Pilmeny Development Project warned today that growing debts will force it to close all 14 community initiatives unless it is thrown a cash lifeline by the city council.

Grieving young people in Midlothian will now be able to access help through music therapy, thanks to a £500 grant from the Princes Trust. Midlothian Young Carers, a project run by Children 1st, is one of 11 organisations to receive a grant from The Princess Royal Trust for Carers in the second round of a grants programme funded by Comic Relief.

Poor food and a lack of qualified staff were just some of the hundreds of complaints triggered by old people’s homes, according to a new report. Elderly care homes accounted for most of the complaints upheld by the care sector’s watchdog body.

{mosimage}The Care Commission investigated 792 complaints about old people’s homes in 2005-06 and upheld more than three quarters of them in whole or in part.

The review was based on the findings of more than 55,000 inspections.

OAP care homes accounted for 57% of all the complaints upheld by the commission.

The private sector had the most complaints, with 37% of privately-run elderly care home services having a complaint against them upheld, compared to just 11% of council-run services and 8% in the voluntary sector.

But this could be because councils have their own well-established complaints procedures, resulting in fewer complaints going to the Care Commission.

The findings came in the annual “quality review” of the commission, which considers evidence from the first four years of the its existence to provide what is claimed to be the first comprehensive national picture of care in Scotland.

Dementia costs Scotland £1.4bn a year but not enough is being done to tackle the problem, according to a leading charity. Alzheimer Scotland said that 58,000 people in Scotland are currently diagnosed with dementia, but that number will almost double to 102,000 by 2031.

Patients were removed from official waiting list figures because of staff shortages at a Scottish hospital, prompting claims last night that the statistics were being manipulated. People waiting for hip and knee replacements in one part of Glasgow were excluded from the Scottish Executive’s much-vaunted waiting times promise.