Fifty jobs and at least one day care centre in either Beaminster or Lyme Regis will go in Dorset County Council’s bid to save £1.5million from its social care budget.

Some murderers are serving too long in jail, meaning prisons will become “full of geriatric lifers”, Lord Chief Justice Lord Phillips has said. He questioned the need for a mandatory life sentence for murder and voiced doubts murder law reforms would succeed without changing the sentencing regime.

University invests in new simulated baby to train midwives, nurses and operating department practitioners. Canterbury Christ Church University has invested in a computer-controlled mannequin of a baby for student midwives, nurses and operating department practitioners to use to practice medical procedures.

A Flying Squad detective was jailed for 18 months yesterday after he unknowingly tried to groom an undercover colleague posing as a young girl in an internet chatroom. Detective Constable Glenn Algar, 45, met what he thought was a 12-year-old on the internet and bombarded her with lurid text messages, Southwark crown court, London, heard.

A leaked version of the Count Me In Census 2006 has revealed that despite the government’s best attempts, discrimination against black patients is still rife when it comes to mental health.

Anti-racism campaigners criticised South Yorkshire police yesterday after the force’s insistence that the fracas between its officer and the black woman he struck several times within the view of CCTV was not a racial incident.

“Complacent and breathtakingly arrogant” is how the Abraham Cowley Pyschiatric Unit’s (ACU) management was described this week.

The number of council “fat cats” earning salaries of more than £100,000 rose by a third last year, the Taxpayers’ Alliance has said. The pressure group said it was an “insult” that such high salaries were being paid on the back of above-inflation council tax rises.

The General Social Care Council (GSCC) has welcomed the announcement by the Secretary of State for Health, Patricia Hewitt, on the Government’s proposals to consult on a new commissioning framework for health and social care.

Dr David Salisbury, who works for the Department of Health, said immunising youngsters against the virus was “a top priority” for the Government. Those hit hardest by flu – including the over-65s and children with medical conditions, such as asthma – already receive free jabs.