Children's Hearings

Date: 29th November 2010
Category: General measures of implementation, Civil Rights and Freedoms, Disability, Basic Health and Welfare

Scotland's most vulnerable children are to benefit from improved support after MSPs backed the Children's Hearings (Scotland) Bill.

The Bill will secure better outcomes for children and young people by improving their rights. It will also create a strengthened, modernised and streamlined system, introducing standards that will, for the first time, deliver national consistency and lead to better informed decisions.

One of the key changes will be the creation of a new national body. Children's Hearings Scotland, whose National Convener will be responsible for setting standards, monitoring their implementation, and for the recruitment, support and training of Scotland's 2,500 local panel members.

The Bill also ensures that they key fundamental principles of protecting children's welfare, set out by Lord Kilbrandon when the Children's Hearings system was first established in the 1960s, remain at heart.