Diners in Edinburgh will be asked to donate £1 to their restaurant bill in August to help the homeless. The UK charity StreetSmart last night launched its 2006 Edinburgh fundraising campaign. Participating restaurants will accept the donations in the busy month when the city’s eateries are filled with visitors to the festivals. Last year’s campaign drive in August and December raised £18,000. The money is distributed to homeless charities in the city.

A disabled man has been left languishing in hospital nearly nine months after doctors gave him the all-clear – because the council can’t find him a home. Alastair Scott was told he was fit to leave Astley Ainsley Hospital in early November after recuperating there from a broken leg. His sister said she would care for the 47-year-old – who is wheelchair-bound and brain-damaged – but needed somewhere bigger than her two-bedroom flat.

An autistic civil servant was fired by tax office managers after union representatives labelled him a health hazard, a tribunal has heard, writes Craig Brown. Patrick Roberts, 48, was sacked from his job with Customs and Excise when representatives from the LTS union described his behaviour as “a health and safety risk” to his fellow workers.

One in five Scots nurses has been bullied or harassed at work in the past year by a colleague, resulting in staff leaving the professions. Presenting what it says are “shocking” findings, the Royal College of Nursing in Scotland said 21% of nurses have suffered abuse from fellow staff and managers.According to the college, the victimisation has led to a quarter of nurses trying to change jobs, while almost 10% had given up their jobs as a result.The figures are revealed in a report called Breaking Point.

Ministers are proposing to abolish the distinct roles of district nurses and health visitors, leading to fears that thousands of patients will not receive the specialist care they need. Under the plans, the extensive range of titles currently used by more than 8000 NHS nurses who work outwith hospitals would merge into one new “community health” job. But nurses’ leaders are concerned the proposed shake-up will ultimately turn all community nurses into generalists and dilute their specialist skills.

Coca-Cola has admitted that it got it wrong when it used the word ‘psychos’ in an advertising campaign for a new soft drink. Complaints from ‘see me’, the Scottish mental health anti-stigma campaign and supporters of Stigma Stop Watch have resulted in the ad being withdrawn from TV, billboards and newspapers as of today, 24th July 2006.

Cocaine Use among Scots in their late 20s and early 30s has almost doubled in a year, according to a new report that suggests it now appears to be the drug of choice for young professionals. Across all age groups, use of the class A drug increased slightly, but in the 25-29 age group it almost doubled, from 1.4 per cent to 2.7 per cent of the population. In the 30-34 age group there was also a marked jump, from 1.9 per cent to 2.8 per cent.

Research by Shelter Scotland has found that more than 6,000 families are being evicted from their home each year. The study showed that 1,625 households were evicted by local authority and registered social landlords in 2004-05 and that 4,441 households were made homeless by the loss of their private sector tenancy in that period. Shelter has called on people in Scotland to back its Home Is… campaign to ensure everyone is housed by 2012. The campaign aims to collect at least 5,000 quotes on what home means to the people of Scotland, to highlight its importance to politicians.

Communities Scotland has awarded £150,000 to Greyfriars Community Project to establish a project giving opportunities to homeless people to make and sell products in Edinburgh’s Old Town. The funding will be used to secure premises and to set up workshops to produce goods to be sold in the shop. In addition the Edinburgh Cyrenians organic farm will supply vegetables to be sold in the shop. The aim of the project is to create 10 full-time jobs and help 60 people into a job.

Sensitive criminal record information and pre-conviction data is to be pooled in a UK-wide database for the first time to try to improve child protection provisions. The Scottish intelligence database has traditionally been kept by and for Scottish forces. But from September, it will be linked to the new national system in England and Wales, allowing officers to access information on any individual across Britain.Critics say the move, which follows the inquiry chaired by Sir Michael Bichard into the deaths of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman in Soham in 2002, raises questions about civil rights and data protection.