National Care Service: factsheet

Improvements we are making in the Bill

We intend to remove Part 1 of the Bill but retain Parts 2 and 3 of the Bill at Stage 2, subject to Parliament’s agreement. These parts of the Bill cover some of our original NCS proposals and we will still implement these if Parliament agrees to the Scottish Government’s Stage 2 amendments.

Anne’s Law

The NCS Bill will place care home providers under a duty to facilitate visits to and by residents unless there is a serious risk to the life, health, or wellbeing of people at the care home. It will also state that some types of visits should always be supported. For example, in end-of-life situations or where there is the possibility of serious harm to a resident’s wellbeing from not having a visit, and this outweighs the serious risk of a visit. This part of the Bill is known as Anne’s Law.

Information sharing and information standards

It is currently too difficult for people to see and contribute to information held about them. It’s also difficult for staff from multiple organisations to access consistent information about an individual. We will establish a scheme for information sharing, so that public health and social care services can be provided efficiently and effectively.

This will also support consistent information standards across health and social care in Scotland. Improving the connectivity of our IT systems and data will make sure that the right people can access the right information, at the right time – including people receiving social care support.

This is important to improving information sharing across health and social care, and to developing an integrated social care and health record. In doing so we will ensure that people have access to data and information about them as they move:

• across services
• locations
• from prevention and early intervention to acute and specialist provision

Rights to breaks for carers

We recognise the huge contribution unpaid carers make to Scotland, support them and protect their wellbeing and caring relationships.

As part of this, the Bill will include a new right to breaks for unpaid carers. This major step is a recommendation of the Independent Review of Adult Social Care.

Ahead of the legislation, we are using funding levers to expand short-break support. The 2025 to 2026 budget includes an additional £5 million to expand low-intensity, preventative voluntary short breaks for carers.

This will bring the total value of the fund to £13 million for 2025/26. This means more carers can access the breaks they need. However, while this will improve access to short breaks for carers, it will not create a right to breaks.

Independent advocacy

We know how crucial independent advocacy is to the human-rights based approach of the NCS. We will consider how we ensure this is available to those who need it.