What skills are important to the social service sector and how are these skills best delivered?  These are just two of the topics expected to be discussed at a series of consultation events being held across Scotland this February and March.

Housing support staff throughout Scotland will soon be able to support their learning and development with the first national Skills Sets developed specifically for their sector which have now been launched by the Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC).

One Plus, the after-school care and nursery provider, has gone into liquidation with the loss of 600 jobs and the collapse of a support network for hundreds of lone parents. Directors took a majority vote to put the charity into voluntary liquidation at an emergency meeting yesterday.

{mosimage}KPMG was last night understood to have been appointed liquidator and is scheduled to hold meetings with staff this morning where it is expected the vast majority will have their redundancies confirmed.

The closure also affects hundreds of volunteers and lone parents who rely on the organisation for support and advice. One Plus management estimates as many as 10,000 people use its services annually.

The Scottish Executive, which refused a rescue package of £2m to One Plus, is demanding answers as to what went wrong. It is understood the executive has been aware of the situation and believes the financial incompetence of the board of directors was responsible for the cash crisis.

Officially, it has said the One Plus refinancing package “just did not stand up”. A senior source at Glasgow City Council, the main client of One Plus, has also said it asked the authority for £3.5m in recent weeks. The council provided a £700,000 stopgap.

Scotland’s smallest local authority has devolved services to local area boards in an attempt to improve the prospects of vulnerable young people.

Hundreds of video witness statements made by child abuse victims were unusable in court because the recordings were of such poor quality. A three-year Scottish Executive pilot project used shop-bought video equipment to record evidence given by vulnerable children when they spoke to police and social workers.

Hundreds of children whose parents are drug addicts face the risk of being taken into care because of a “moral panic” over the issue, Scotland’s drug and alcohol tsar has warned.

Criminals in Scotland are to be given vitamins in an innovative attempt to cut violence and antisocial behaviour. Inmates at a Scottish prison are to take part in a government-sponsored study to determine whether healthy eating can help influence behaviour.

Concern is mounting for the jobs of 600 staff at the crisis-hit One Plus, one of Scotland’s biggest after-school and nursery providers. The company, which owned a chain of creches which collapsed last month, has told unions staff may not be paid after tomorrow.

Alcohol and drug addiction among teenagers in Glasgow is to be treated with a new form of therapy that involves their family. A pilot project will see about 40 teenagers with addictions take part in family therapy.

Some of Scotland’s worst serial offenders, such as shoplifters, housebreakers and prostitutes, are to be given the choice of signing up to drugs and alcohol rehabilitation or being pro-actively targeted by police.