A plan which will shape foster and kinship care in Scotland over the next 20 years will today be unveiled by Education Minister Hugh Henry. A consultation on the National Fostering and Kinship Care Strategy, which includes proposals to improve care for foster children and the support offered to those providing care, will be launched at Edinburgh Castle.

{mosimage}Children, young people and their foster and kinship carers will be asked to log on here to register their opinion on the strategy.

The strategy – drafted with support from a panel of experts including The Fostering Network, BAAF, Barnardos, NCH, ADSW, CoSLA and foster and kinship carers – contains proposals to:

• Give every child in foster or kinship care a better chance by providing them with safe, stable and secure placement

• Allow a young person in foster/kinship care to remain in home beyond 18th birthday if appropriate

• Improve recruitment and retention of foster carers through additional support

• Determine and standardise payments across Scotland to foster carers.

Mr Henry, who will launch the consultation during a reception for foster and kinship carers, said: “Scotland’s children are its future. We want every child to have a safe, stable and secure home environment to give them the best start in life.

When Reece Walters saw what had happened to his research, he was shocked and appalled. He and colleagues at Stirling University had been tasked with providing an independent report to ministers on youth court pilot schemes, but Mr Walters says he soon found the real limits of academic freedom.

A scoutmaster who spent months planning a fake camp so he could lure boys home and sexually abuse them was jailed for nine months yesterday. Assistant Scout commissioner Alan Grant plied two 15-year-old boys with drink and waited until they fell asleep before pouncing.

A psychiatrist who hosted a wild Roman toga party where a guest died from a drugs overdose was struck off yesterday. A GMC disciplinary panel decided that Dr Clint Tatchell’s “extensive and wide-ranging misconduct” made him incompatible with being a doctor.

A new £4.3million elderly residential complex was today unveiled on the site of an old Clyde shipyard. The development on the north bank of the river at the former Yarrow’s yard in Yoker will provide 20 flats. Tenants will have access to 24-hour care and support in the joint project between West of Scotland Housing Association, Glasgow City Council and Church of Scotland social care agency Crossreach.

Scotland’s first official strategy to encourage and structure volunteering is to be launched in the Capital. Inspiring Volunteering: A Volunteering Strategy for Edinburgh, aims to encourage people to join projects, ranging from teaching or supporting people with special needs, to working in shops.

Better prevention, more local care and improved support to help aid recovery are to be the focus of mental health services in the future, according to a newly published delivery plan Delivering for Mental Health. There are also to be a new set of high-level targets to provide better care in the community by cutting back on the increase of anti-depressant prescribing by supporting people in different ways, and reducing the number of people with mental ill-health who need to be re-admitted to hospital.

Talks between union and Glasgow council leaders yesterday failed to stall an unprecedented strike by key public service workers, which will leave care homes for vulnerable children and the elderly unstaffed. A walkout by up to 10,000 members of public sector union Unison over a pay review will leave the city’s key social care services without “life and limb cover” for three days from Tuesday to Thursday this week.

A pre-Christmas information campaign to prevent drug-related deaths among users during the high-risk festive holiday period in Glasgow is to be launched in conjunction with Scottish Drugs Forum. The aim is to raise awareness among drug users of the heightened risks of overdose and death over the holiday period when many services are closed and users may be feeling more vulnerable.

New laws to open up the adoption system to gay and unmarried couples will not reduce the number of children in care unless extra funding is provided to help support prospective parents. That was the stark warning this weekend from adoption agencies, who said families could be left with inadequate support if funding for social work and psychological services is not improved.