A political row has blown up over the awarding of research grants by Assembly social justice minister Edwina Hart’s department to an academic team which includes a close party ally. Plaid Cymru’s shadow social justice minister Leanne Wood has called for a top-level investigation into her concerns about contracts awarded to the University of Glamorgan’s Welsh Institute of Health and Social Care. The Institute’s senior fellow is Tony Beddow, chair of Swansea County Labour Party and former chair of Ms Hart’s own Gower constituency party. An Assembly Government spokeswoman has angrily rejected Ms Wood’s allegations, saying all the contracts had been awarded in line with correct procedures.

Medical mistakes in Wales have cost YOU more than £335m in the past seven years, we can reveal. That is the figure the NHS has been forced to pay in compensation and legal fees for botched operations and dodgy diagnoses since the National Assembly was set up. In the past year alone, NHS trusts and local health boards have paid out a total of £37m, including more than £1.2m in lawyers’ fees.

Calls to raise allowances to help foster carers look after children in Wales have been made by a charity. The Fostering Network, in a newly published report, claims £3m more is needed to help some foster carers. It wants to see minimum allowance levels set but payments varied among the 22 Welsh local councils. The Welsh Assembly Government said it valued foster carers’ contributions and would look at the financial issues and payment methods shortly. The Fostering Network wants to see minimum allowances ranging from £115 to £198 per week.

Additional investment of £3 million per year is needed to stop hundreds of Welsh foster carers being left out of pocket as a result of fostering, according to a report published by charity the Fostering Network tomorrow. A survey of all 22 local authorities found that foster carers in nearly half are still receiving allowances below the Fostering Network’s recommended minimum levels. The £3 million would be required in order to provide all foster carers with the Fostering Network’s rates. Allowances are designed to cover the costs incurred by a foster carer in looking after a fostered child. The survey found actual allowances as low as £67 per week for the youngest children, compared with the recommended rate of £115.

For Patricia Stimpson, the care centre her two children have visited for almost 30 years has been a lifeline. But the Castlefields centre, which offers daycare for people with learning disabilities, faces an uncertain future along with four other centres in Cardiff. Now the centres are to be changed in a massive shake-up of services for people with learning disabilities which, according to the council, aims to shift the focus of care into the community. But Mrs Stimpson, 65, who has two children, Suzanne, 42, and John, 40, with learning disabilities and in need of constant care, hit back at changes to the service.

One person was taken to hospital as 14 residents were evacuated from a nursing home in Llanelli during a fire. Firefighters were called to the St Elli Home in Queen Victoria Road at 4am on Thursday after a fire broke out in a first floor airing cupboard. Social services rehoused the residents, three of which were bed-bound, at an alternative home in the town. A spokeswoman for the fire service said the first floor was smoked damaged and the cause was being investigated. Firefighters wearing breathing apparatus helped evacuate the residents and the fire was extinguished just after 0500 BST. The man taken to hospital was suffering from smoke inhalation.

Farming families across Wales are being encouraged to consider careers in social care as the need for carers in rural areas grows. “We need to attract and develop a skilled local workforce to deliver care and offer services to rural communities,” said Parry Davies, chair of Mid Wales Social Care Partnership. “Farming families already have many transferable skills required by the care sector, and the remainder we can develop through training.” The Partnership has produced an information pack of case studies of people from farming backgrounds who moved into the care sector.

Council staff could take industrial action in a bitter row over plans to reorganise services for people with learning disabilities in Cardiff. Union officials claim the shake-up could lead to staff being sacked and ordered to reapply for the jobs on different terms and conditions. The changes, according to the council, are aimed at giving the 240 clients a more community-based service allowing them to pursue lifestyles in their own areas. The emphasis of the existing five day centres – two in Canton and others in Ely, Rumney and Tremorfa – will be changed and replaced by up to six area bases. But families are concerned about closing the centres.

Patients in mid Wales are suffering because of a “shambolic situation” in health care on the Wales-England border, an assembly member has claimed. Glyn Davies says arrangements to treat Powys patients at Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital (RJAH), in Shropshire, are in “turmoil”.

Wales’ most senior judge is due to warn that a lack of prisons in Wales could be hindering offenders’ rehabilitation. Sir Roderick Evans will call for more prison places in Wales saying families often have to travel long distances to visit relatives in jail. This endangers family contact which is vital for prisoners’ reintegration into society, the judge will tell a Law Society event on Thursday.