Hearings for Children report: response

The development of this response

The vision and ambition of the report broadly aligns with the policy trajectory and longer-term aspirations of the Scottish Government. Since receiving the report in May 2023, officials in policy teams across the Scottish Government have undertaken several stages of analysis of the ‘Hearings for Children’ (HfC) report and recommendations, seeking to understand:

• any connections with, gaps in, or conflicts with, existing policy,
• legal and financial implications of any changes – e.g. would a change in law be required to deliver a recommendation?
• any unintended or unforeseen consequences associated with recommended changes
• what would need to happen to make the recommended change possible
• the evidence supporting the proposals, and the potential benefits they would deliver.

As well as the internal analysis activity, policy officials have also worked with statutory delivery partners in the children’s hearings system – learning from those responsible for the system’s day to day running. This has been to identify relevant existing or planned practice, and current improvement programmes already underway, along with assessing the appetite and capacity for change. Officials have also drawn on partners’ professional expertise to identify those HfC recommendations that can be driven forward by practitioners, managers and other leaders without new law or Government action.

This work identified that actions that would deliver against a number of HfC recommendations were already happening, or work was already planned that reflected, at least to some extent, the ambitions of the report.

Officials’ analysis also confirmed that consultation and further in-depth engagement with a broad range of delivery partners, interested parties and stakeholders will help define the necessary detail to deliver wider aspirations in the most appropriate way.

Many of the issues considered by the HfC report cannot progress without changes to primary legislation or significant changes to existing systems or structures, roles and responsibilities. Policy proposals within new legislation must first be subject to full, open public consultation. A significant number of recommendations will require to be subject to this process – that consultation is planned for 2024. This will offer a proper engagement platform to all those likely to be impacted, or who have a stake in the outcome of the consultation.

A number of HfC report recommendations either mapped complex inter-dependencies, or specifically identified the need for further research or exploration before final decisions could be made about the best future course of action. Where we have identified the need for this additional work, we will ensure that it is planned appropriately - to avoid placing undue burden on children, families, or on system actors. We will also seek to avoid unnecessary delay to the process of change.

It is important that in introducing system change it is undertaken at the appropriate pace, avoiding disruption to what is presently working well. It is imperative that the children and young people who are supported by the children’s hearings system continue to receive the high level of protection provided by the system throughout the period of change, and that there is no disruption to collective joint working to keep The Promise.