The number of prisoner complaints soared to a record high last year, a report has revealed. A total of 460 grievances were filed by inmates, the largest number in the 12-year history of the Scottish Prison Complaints Commission (SPCC). The report also showed there were 70 more complaints than the previous year.

A care worker who looked after an 83-year-old millionaire married him almost three months before his death – and inherited £750,000. Marion Morris, 52, wed frail Ross Smith in his country mansion as the old man sat hooked up to an oxygen tank in a wheelchair. Ross changed his will five weeks before the ceremony to leave Marion half his fortune. She will get at least £750,000, including half the cash from the sale of her husband’s house. If it fetches a high enough price, she could become a millionaire herself.

Marc Donnachie is 25 years old. For the past seven years, he says, he has been a junkie, a jagger and a smackhead. He struggles to remember how many times he has been to prison, but thinks it’s about 12. His teeth, white and gleaming, are all false. Heroin addicts, he tells me, usually have rotten teeth because they don’t think about eating meals, only sugary tea and chocolate.

Campaigners fighting to save rural maternity services in Aberdeenshire are getting a final opportunity to present their case ahead of a decision. NHS Grampian is assessing the future of maternity units at Aboyne, Fraserburgh, Banff and Huntly. The health board has recommended stopping maternity services at the units due to declining birth rates. Several mothers, some with babies, are expected to lobby the board in Aberdeen ahead of a decision on Tuesday.

A new £20 million home for the elderly would be built in an eyesore area of Morningside in Edinburgh, according to the plans of an American company. The proposals, submitted to the city council by US firm Sunrise Senior Living, would see a mansion-style care home built on the corner of Whitehouse Loan and Newbattle Terrace, which is currently filled with derelict houses. The company earmarked the site for development in April, but has now changed the plans after consulting concerned local councillors and community leaders who feared the home would not fit in with the surrounding area.

A project in the Highlands designed to help teenagers affected by substance misuse or anti-social behaviour has won national recognition. Gael Og Mentoring, run by children’s charity NCH Scotland, is one of the first such services in Scotland to be awarded Approved Provider Status (APS). The APS scheme was developed by the Mentoring and Befriending Foundation with support from the Home Office.

Children from the age of five should be encouraged to drink wine at home to prevent the toll of alcohol abuse in later life, one of the country’s leading experts on the problem has told Scotland on Sunday. Jack Law, chief executive of Alcohol Focus Scotland and a member of the Scottish Ministerial Advisory Committee on Alcohol Problems, believes the practice would cut binge drinking among youngsters by taking the mystery out of alcohol.

A two-year-old child has died after contracting the E.coli O157 infection. The girl, from Ballantrae, in South Ayrshire, died at the weekend after being taken to the Royal Hospital for Sick Children in Glasgow. A health board spokeswoman said two children in the Dumfries and Galloway area, who had been in contact with the girl, had also tested positive. A 20-month-old and a child of three were admitted to hospital at the weekend but have since been released.

A pioneering welfare-to-work scheme is proving so successful in getting people off benefit and back into the workplace that yesterday it was decided to up its target for 2010 to 40,000 from 30,000. Glasgow Welfare to Work Forum has the chance of a slice of £5m and inclusion in the government’s new Cities Strategy scheme.It is aimed at allowing local areas to deliver tailormade solutions to getting people back into work rather than being served with rigid diktats from Whitehall.

Diners in Edinburgh will be asked to donate £1 to their restaurant bill in August to help the homeless. The UK charity StreetSmart last night launched its 2006 Edinburgh fundraising campaign. Participating restaurants will accept the donations in the busy month when the city’s eateries are filled with visitors to the festivals. Last year’s campaign drive in August and December raised £18,000. The money is distributed to homeless charities in the city.