The Independent Care Review was commissioned in 2016 to find out what Scotland needs to do to meet the needs of its care experienced people and make sure they grow up loved, safe and respected.
The Care Review listened to more than 5,500 experiences of care across Scotland. Over half of these were children, young people and adults who had lived in care, and the rest were families and the workforce.
On 5 February 2020, the Review published seven reports including the main volume ‘The Promise’ setting out what needs to change and how. The same day, the Scottish Government accepted all the recommendations of the Review and made a pledge to #KeepThePromise by 2030.
The Promise Scotland was established to support work towards keeping the promise. In March 2021, they published Plan 21-24 outlining what needs to change first. In June 2024, they published Plan 24-30.
The Fostering Network is committed to keeping The Promise.
This includes:
- amending our use of language and establishing a language and re-framing group
- continuing to place the voices of children and young people at the heart of our work by establishing a young people’s advisory board for children and young people in foster care, and birth children of foster carers, in Scotland
- continuing to deliver projects which align with the current work strands in Plan 24-30 including:
- taking a proactively child centred approach to our work, for example, rewriting our allegations toolkit and concerns and complaints signpost.
Children (Care, Care Experience and Services Planning) (Scotland) Act 2026
The Scottish Government introduced the Children (Care, Care Experience and Services Planning) (Scotland) Bill in 2025 to make some legislative changes needed to keep the Promise. The content of the Bill was informed by the recommendations of the independent care review and consultations held in 2024 and 2025.
Ahead of the Bill's introduction, in April 2025, we wrote to the Children's Minister setting out our key priorities for The Promise Bill.
The Children (Care, Care Experience and Services Planning) Act passed its third reading in March 2026 and became law in May 2026.
We were pleased by provisions included to introduce a register of foster carers, create a right to advocacy for care-experienced people, and extend the discretionary age limit for Continuing Care to age 26, but disappointed that other key changes we campaigned for were missing from the legislation, such as amendments to ensure pay parity between local authority and independent fostering services.
Read the Act as passed here: Children (Care, Care Experience and Services Planning) (Scotland) Act 2026
Work continues towards keeping The Promise and ensuring the voices of care-experienced people and foster carers are at the heart of Government policy.
Read our statement on the passing of the Act here and more about what we campaigned for at various stages of the Bill here.