Chamber and committees

There are no changes planned to the system of vetting and barring set out in the Protection of Vulnerable Groups (Scotland) Act 2007. Ministers are now considering the detailed analysis of a recent consultation on policy proposals for secondary legislation and expect to publish a full response after the Scottish Parliamentary summer recess. Secondary legislation will be laid before Parliament in due course and several significant Scottish Statutory Instruments will be consulted on in draft in advance of that.

The effective sharing of information is a critical element of the Scottish Government’s “Getting it Right for Every Child” agenda for change. This new approach to children’s services will allow for a single record to be created and jointly owned by all of those agencies with an interest in a particular child. The record will be a subset of all of the data held by these agencies and will be electronically assembled through the eCare Framework. This virtual record will be accessible by any agency that is working with the young person. Access to the record need not be limited by local authority boundaries where it is appropriate for the information to be shared elsewhere.

Of course, there will still be a need for professionals to work in partnership effectively where they require to share single agency records relating to a young person. The lack of a single mechanism should not act as a barrier preventing professionals from ensuring that information is shared appropriately with their partners whether they be from a different professional background or geographic area.

A national multi-agency working group has recently reported to ministers with a series of recommendations for strategic action relating to service provision for young runaways. The group identified the need for significant action in a number of areas including risk assessment, training, emergency accommodation and refuge provision, data collation and improved practice in relation to the delivery of Return Home Welfare Interviews for young people who run away from home or care. Ministers have asked for work to be undertaken in partnership with stakeholders on how best to take forward the recommendations.

Single outcome agreements (SOAs) for 2008-09 have been agreed with all 32 councils and should all now be publicly available. All SOAs should reflect the priorities and agreed outcomes for each council and include relevant supporting indicators and targets. As councils were responsible for producing the SOAs and are responsible for the delivery of local service, questions regarding the content of individual SOAs should be directed to them in the first instance.

The Scottish Government has no plans to provide central grant funding to any advice agencies other than to Citizens Advice Scotland to deliver a specialist service for kinship carers.

This is a matter for local authorities and the information is not held centrally.

The power to advance wellbeing contained in section 20 of the Local Government in Scotland Act 2003 allows local authorities to make payments to individuals or groups; this could include families and may include families who are struggling financially, depending on the whole circumstances of the case.

The concordat between Scottish Government and COSLA included a commitment to pay approved kinship carers of looked after children a weekly allowance, at a rate equivalent to that paid by the local authority to their foster carers, with a deduction made for child benefit. As set out in Scottish Budget: Spending Review 2007, funding to meet this commitment has been incorporated into the total local government settlement. It is the responsibility of local authorities to determine how the commitment will be met locally.

The Scottish Government is aware of 38 child contact centres across Scotland. Details are in the following table. The Scottish Government provides core funding for the 13 local family mediation service providers which they can use to provide child contact centres along with funding from other sources such as local authorities or trusts. Of the 38 contact centres mentioned, seven are independent and we have no knowledge of funding sources. There may be other contact centre facilities which the Scottish Government has no knowledge of.

Child Contact Centres “ April 2008

Area	Number of Centres	Locations
Aberdeenshire	1	Aberdeen, VSA Children''s Society
Argyll and Bute	3	Oban Dunoon Helensburgh
Borders	4	Eyemouth Galashiels Hawick Kelso
Central	3	Alloa Falkirk Stirling
Dumfries and Galloway	1	Dumfries
Grampian	5	Banff Fraserburgh Cedarwood Peterhead Peterhead, Drummer''s Corner
Inverclyde	1	Inverclyde
Lothian	6	Livingston, Eliburn Edinburgh, Dr Bell''s Edinburgh, Granton Edinburgh, Olivebank Edinburgh, Viewforth Whitburn
Orkney	1	Orkney
Renfrewshire	1	Paisley, The Wynd
S Lanarkshire	4	Hamilton, Burnbank East Kilbride Lesmahagow Hamilton, St Mary''s
Tayside and Fife	4	Arbroath, Angus Dundee Fife Perth
West	3	Glasgow Kilmarnock Glasgow, Renfield St
Western Isles	1	Stornoway

 

The Minister for Community Safety wrote to the president of the Sheriffs'' Association in March 2008 requesting a meeting to discuss family law issues, including the enforcement of contact orders.