Casey’s review of adult social care offers hope | Letters

Louise Casey may have the power of words behind her (The blistering speech that tells me Britain’s social care deadlock can finally be broken, 10 March), but what she’s uncovered is a truth that local authorities have been voicing for years: the national care service will fail unless ministers stabilise the local systems that underpin it.Key Cities (a cross-party network of UK local authorities) has long been calling for an urgent funding reset for the social care system. And while the Casey commission’s reforms are welcome, what’s still missing is the transition plan to enable councils to make this happen. A key part of the government’s NHS 10‑year plan must be a significant expansion of joint commissioning, across regional and national scales. This collaboration will finally end the costly push‑pull between those who fund and those who deliver care and, vitally, lay the foundations for effective transformation from local to national provision

Give mayors more powers to tackle youth unemployment crisis, says Alan Milburn

Mayors across England should be given greater powers to tackle the youth unemployment crisis and avoid the “long-term scarring” of regions outside London, the government’s work tsar has said.Alan Milburn, who is leading a major review into increasing inactivity among Britain’s young people, said the issue could not be solved by Whitehall alone.Most of the nearly 1 million young people not in work, education or training (Neets) are in the north and Midlands. Eight of the 10 local authorities with the highest number of Neets are in these two regions.In an interview with the Guardian, Milburn said: “Local authorities and mayors have an absolutely critical role to play because they’ve got convening power – they can bring together schools, the colleges, the employers in an area

Patients face long journeys for medicines as pharmacies cut weekend hours

People who need to obtain medication at the weekend are having to undertake long trips because more pharmacies are cutting their opening hours on Saturdays and Sundays.One in six pharmacies in England have reduced their hours at weekends since 2022, with some shutting altogether, as a result of “unsustainable” pressures on their budgets.The cuts mean that overall more than 20% of weekend opening hours have been lost, which has left pharmacy services increasingly unavailable, according to the National Pharmacy Association (NPA).That has forced some patients to go to an A&E or urgent treatment centre to get the morning-after pill, or an emergency prescription or advice on how to treat a minor ailment.Rural areas such as Devon, Cornwall and the Lake District were particularly affected, although in cities such as Manchester and Leeds there had also been less weekend opening, the NPA said

Hundreds of thousands of NHS staff in England attacked and harassed, survey shows

Hundreds of thousands of NHS staff have been attacked, harassed, bullied, or subject to racism, latest NHS figures show.The health service’s 2025 staff survey found that one in seven had experienced violence from patients or the public, while more than a quarter reported harassment, bullying and abuse, the highest levels in three years.Given that the NHS in England employs 1.5 million people, this would equate to about 217,000 experiencing violence and more than 380,000 reporting harassment and bullying in 2025 alone.Sexual harassment has also reached record levels, the figures show

Life with my autistic sons: ‘How do you explain all the worries, the sleepless nights?’

When James Hunt began posting about his boys online, it was a way to describe the emotions and experiences of their extraordinary lives. In sharing his family’s joy and struggles, he realised they weren’t aloneMy conversation with James Hunt begins the usual way: an exchange of hellos, followed by the most mundane of questions. “How are you?” I ask.Although he responds predictably – “I’m all right … I’m good” – we both know that underneath this answer lurks a whole world of experience, and the plain fact that some people’s everyday lives are lived in extraordinary circumstances.Six months ago, this fortysomething father was leading the kind of life that might have caused plenty of people to break into small emotional pieces

Proposed law change will protect abusive men who push women to suicide, campaigners warn

Men whose abusive behaviour drives women to take their own lives are more likely to get away with their crimes because of proposed law changes, justice campaigners say.Ministers want to make it harder for inquests to pass verdicts of unlawful killing, which have been crucial in getting justice for women who killed themselves after suffering abuse.In October last year, Georgia Barter was found to have been unlawfully killed after suffering a decade of domestic violence and abuse. In 2023, an inquest found that Kellie Sutton, whose death was classed originally as a suicide, was unlawfully killed after suffering domestic abuse.The unlawful killing verdicts followed campaigns by the families of the women