News round up: Red tape blocking success of care farms

Red tape blocking success of care farms

It sounds like a perfect fit.

On the one hand, the therapeutic benefits of fresh air, home-grown food and caring for animals are well known. On the other, the social care system is desperately seeking alternatives to unpopular residential homes for the disabled and elderly, and rehabilitation units for troubled youngsters and drug addicts.

Yet care farms have failed to take off in Britain in the way they have on the Continent, where they can be vital healthcare providers, as well as generating additional sources of agricultural income.
Read more on this story in The Times

Young offenders are being held in ‘dungeons’, says child jail report

Young offenders are detained in “modern-day dungeons” where they suffer injuries from forced physical restraint, strip searches and are denied access to showers and toilets, a damning report on the state of child jails says today.

The report by the Howard League for Penal Reform, which examined the findings of inspections of 15 jails holding children, found “dire conditions” across the system.
Read more on this story in The Guardian