A disabled County Down student has won damages against a care company after it refused to lift her out of her wheelchair to attend university. Laura Lee Jenkins, 21, from Saintfield is paralysed from the chest down.

Children as young as 10 were among six juveniles arrested during disturbances in Londonderry, police have said. Two of the youths were arrested for disorderly behaviour and the other four on suspicion of riotous assembly on Tuesday night.

What are the side effects of cancer? Weight loss, nausea, tiredness. These are all recognisable to any of us who have been affected by cancer. But poverty, homelessness, bankruptcy, these ‘side effects’ are less frequently in the headlines.

Justice Minister Michael McDowell is expected to publish his new bill to tackle gangland crime later today. The Criminal Justice Bill is understood to include provisions that would force judges to impose mandatory 10-year prison sentences on people caught with large quantities of drugs.

An organisation that aims to tackle drug and alcohol problems in Northern Ireland has reported impressive results from its new pilot programme. The Lifematters programme was designed to combat substance misuse among children as young as eight years old.

The British Medical Association in NI is urging smokers to use No Smoking Day (14th March) to prepare for 30th April 2007, the day when Northern Ireland goes smokefree. From 30th April this year all enclosed workplaces and public places in Northern Ireland will not allow any smoking.

A project tackling drug and alcohol misuse among children is being extended, it has been revealed. The Lifematters programme, which ran in Lisburn, is being extended to cover the Eastern Health Board area.

The countdown is under way with exactly seven weeks left from today before the Government stubs out smoking in Northern Ireland’s workplaces. In 49 days’ time, it will be illegal to smoke in all enclosed workplaces across the province – including pubs, clubs and restaurants.

The north Belfast priest who was seriously injured during an apparent armed robbery in South Africa has given his first media interview since he was shot.

A man who used his position as a youth club leader to sexually abuse two young brothers walked into a police station to confess, a court heard yesterday.