A nurse stole a dying war veteran’s wallet to pay a telephone bill, Liverpool Magistrates’ Court heard. Veronica Harold, 47, admitted theft and fraud by falsely using 83-year-old Albert Davies’s Barclays Bank card to pay a £248 BT bill.

Psychiatric units should carry out regular audits of sexual behaviour, complaints and allegations of harassment or abuse psychiatrists are urging.

A care home has pledged to improve its procedures after a probe into the death of an elderly resident. David Yorke, who stayed at Chichester Court Care Home in South Shields, died a few hours after being admitted to South Tyneside District Hospital last July.

People will get social care quicker under proposals by Devon County Council – but it could lead to job losses. Vulnerable people with more complex needs will have the most skilled and expensive resources faster.

A care home worker has been sacked for abusing elderly people, The Northern Echo can reveal. The woman was dismissed after mobile phone footage emerged showing her goading frail and elderly residents into shouting foul-mouthed abuse at each other.

Basic hygiene care of elderly people on a geriatric ward has been likened to that in the Third World. County councillor Geoffrey Heathcock has hit out after learning about the experience of an 82-year-old patient on ward F3 at Addenbrooke’s Hosptial in Cambridge.

Seventy-four residents with learning disabilities are now on the scheme, which is up from 57 people in April when Brent Council had more than any other London borough.

A hearing into the conduct of a Registered Social Worker from Rochdale will be held from 4 September 2007 until 7 September 2007 by the social care workforce regulator for England, the General Social Care Council (GSCC).

A training charity has launched two brand-new qualifications in childcare and education. The new level two and three qualifications aim to bring training up-to-date to reflect the Early Years Foundation Stage, which will come into force in April 2008.

About 700 mental health workers are on strike in Manchester in protest at the suspension of a shop steward. The three-day walkout has led to some psychiatric patients being moved to centres up to 100 miles away, while others have been sent home.

{mosimage}Public sector union Unison said it was shocked at the move but Manchester Mental Health and Social Care Trust has said that it had no alternative. Karen Reissmann, a psychiatric nurse, was suspended in June for allegedly bringing the trust into disrepute. Unison claims that Ms Reissmann has been targeted because she is a shop steward who has spoken out against cuts in mental health services.

The union claimed 60 psychiatric patients at North Manchester General Hospital had been moved to private facilities. Although it did not give exact figures, the trust said patients were moved to Alpha Care in Bury and to Affinity Health Care in Darlington.

Sandra Corrigan, one of the nurses on strike, said: “None of them were happy about going, some of them were shouting and screaming out of the taxi windows as they were driven away.” But the trust said those patients that had been moved were settling in well, while 32 were clinically assessed to be fit enough to go home for a short period of leave.