Over the past fortnight, the Education, Children and Young People Committee of the Scottish Parliament has been considering the Promise Bill at stage two of a three-stage process to decide whether it should become law. At this stage MSPs can table amendments and the committee decides whether they agree to them. We’ve been closely following the committee’s meetings so far and we’re pleased that progress has been made on several key issues we’ve been campaigning for on behalf of our members – foster carer finances, the register of foster carers and Continuing Care.
Foster carer finances
We supported the Children’s Minister’s amendments to place an annual inflationary uprating duty on any fostering allowances specified in regulations and to require local authorities to publish their foster carer payment rates. We’ve long campaigned for this to ensure allowances keep pace with inflation and to increase transparency for carers, so we’re excited that the children’s committee has accepted these amendments.
Allowance rates are currently set out in guidance rather than regulations, so the uprating duty won’t apply until ministers use their existing powers to specify allowance rates in regulations.
However, we are encouraged that this amendment creates an implicit expectation that ministers will use these powers, which would also have the benefit of placing allowances on a statutory footing.
We will seek to strengthen this at stage three by pushing for an explicit requirement for ministers to set out both allowance and fee rates in regulations.
Register for foster carers
We worked with Martin Whitfield MSP (Lab) on amendments to ensure the register of foster carers is proportionate and carers can access their own data. We’re really pleased that the committee has also accepted these amendments.
The first amendment ensures data about individuals who are considered but not ultimately approved as foster carers can only be held in the register if the decision not to approve them was based on safeguarding concerns. This is to avoid potentially ‘blacklisting’ applicants who are not approved due to their personal circumstances – such as changes in their housing, relationship or work situation – rather than concerns about their suitability to work with children. It also avoids putting people off applying to foster based on concerns about being added to a national register as a ‘not approved’ carer if their circumstances change or they decide fostering is not right for them.
The second amendment encourages ministers to consider foster carers’ access to and ability to request correction to their personal data in the register, when making regulations to create the register. This is based on our position that foster carers should be able to view the information that is held about them in the register and edit some of this data – for example, to add details of training they have completed to provide more tailored matching suggestions for services. Therefore, this amendment ensures this is considered in the development of the register.
Sadly the committee rejected Martin Whitfield’s amendment to create a Scottish Foster Carers' Council to oversee the register, and Roz McCall’s (Con) amendment on safeguarding and transparency, with the Children’s Minister saying they were too specific at this stage.
We’ll keep campaigning to ensure the register is held independently and provides proper support and protection for both carers and children.
Continuing Care
We were also disappointed that last week the committee rejected Martin Whitfield’s amendment to extend the upper age threshold for Continuing Care to age 26 and introduce a right to return to Continuing Care. Instead they accepted Nicola Sturgeon’s (SNP) amendment to give local authorities the discretion to provide Continuing Care up to age 25 where needed. This is progress, but as a discretionary power rather than a legal duty, it doesn’t go far enough. Nicola Sturgeon also tabled an amendment to give those who have left care a right to access Continuing Care, which the committee accepted. While we welcome this, it still does not give those who left Continuing Care the right to return to it.
Stage two of the bill continues next Wednesday but our key amendments have now been debated. As well as these amendments, we are delighted that the committee has accepted amendments to restate provisions on aftercare and the register of foster carers as freestanding sections of the bill, bringing them in scope of the UNCRC (Incorporation) (Scotland) Act 2024. This is a win for children’s rights and a challenge to any future attempts by the Scottish Government to create legislation that is not UNCRC-compliant.
You can watch the committee’s day one (4 Feb) and day two (11 Feb) meetings on stage two of the Promise Bill, and look out for their day three meeting next Wednesday 18 Feb on Scottish Parliament TV.
