Councillors could raise the price of care home services. Aberdeenshire Council will hold a meeting to discuss soaring costs.

Union leaders are to meet NHS Highland’s director of nursing amid growing concerns over a community nursing pilot project.

Care home residents are set to benefit from increased payments to cover the cost of free personal and nursing care.

A GROUND-BREAKING cancer care centre has opened in Scotland. The specialist unit is for patients with urological cancers – those affecting the kidney, prostate and testicles.

A package of cost-control measures has been put in place to tackle a £1.3m overspend forecast for social work services in Dumfries and Galloway.

Fife Council has agreed to a public meeting on its controversial new homecare charges. After weeks of pressures and political fighting over the increased costs, the local authority has admitted things could have been done differently – and bowed to campaigners to have a public forum.

{mosimage}It takes place at Rothes Halls, Glenrothes, on Friday, February 1 and is expected to attract campaigners and many local residents worried and concerned about the impact of the new charges.

The meeting will attempt to clarify to the public exactly what the new charges will mean and how they will affect Fife’s disabled and elderly population.

The administration has been accused by the Campaign Against Charges (CAC) group, as well as several councillors, of illegally implementing the charges without a proper policy in place.

A Kirkcaldy councillor has also written to a senior official to ascertain whether the implementation has been legal.

Councillor David Ross said: “There have been failings with implementation in terms of what information has been put out.

There was an error in statistics published in December 2007 relating to breaches of Restriction of Liberty Orders (RLOs).

Claims have been made that social services in Fife are in crisis over changes to the home care policy.

{mosimage}The local authority is planning to introduce massive rises in the amount it charges people who need carers. It has frozen all new claims and many people have said they have been left in a state of limbo. Others have said they can no longer afford to have carers. Fife Council said the changes, which come into affect after Christmas, are needed to meet a budget shortfall.

But a group of people who are affected by the changes have formed a campaign group to try to convince the council to reverse its decision over the price increases.

Campaign Against Charges has said many elderly people or those with disabilities will have to choose between having carers in their homes or paying fuel bills.

The carers carry out duties such as washing or bathing a person, helping them in and out of bed or carrying out household chores.

For some people, the cost of the service is increasing from £4 per week to £8,000 per year.

Tom and Agnes Robson from Lochgelly, both in their 70s, act as carers for their daughter Marie who has special needs and needs round the clock care.

In July, Marie signed a tenancy agreement with a local housing association on a specially adapted house.

But the freeze on new care packages has meant she has been unable to move into the property, which has since stood empty.

A Social work overhaul in Aberdeen will see hundreds of vulnerable adults lose care provision or have it scaled down in the coming months.

People in North Ayrshire who use social work services and their carers are generally positive about the resulting improvements in their lives, according to an inspection report published yesterday, by the Social Work Inspection Agency (SWIA).