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Education, Children and Young People Committee 04 February 2026 [Draft]

04 Feb 2026 · S6 · Education, Children and Young People Committee

Item of business

Children (Care, Care Experience and Services Planning) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 2

Don-Innes, Natalie SNP Renfrewshire North and West Watch on SPTV

Sorry, convener, I was a little bit behind—I am organised now.I welcome the opportunity to speak to this group of amendments, which relates to kinship care assistance. Amendments 1, 2 and 3 form a coherent package of Government amendments designed to strengthen the statutory framework for kinship care. Together, they introduce a clear right to a comprehensive needs-based assessment, ensure that local authorities have regard to statutory guidance, and improve national oversight through proportionate information-sharing powers.For kinship carers and the children they care for, the amendments are about making support clearer and more reliable, so that families know what help they can ask for and how it will be considered, and can expect greater consistency across Scotland. At their heart, the amendments are about ensuring that children growing up in kinship care are properly supported, in line with our commitments under the Promise. They introduce a clear right for eligible kinship carers to request and be offered a comprehensive needs-based assessment, so that support is considered in the round and reflects families’ individual circumstances. The assessment is intended to be child centred and align with existing GIRFEC practice and the child's plan, supporting rather than duplicating current assessment and planning processes.My amendments are also intended to strengthen the role of statutory guidance and introduce proportionate information-sharing powers, helping to improve consistency, transparency and national oversight, so that we can better understand how kinship support is working across Scotland, while respecting local delivery.I understand the intent behind Jeremy Balfour’s amendment 4. Indeed, kinship carers should be properly supported and treated fairly; my amendments seek to achieve that. However, I am not able to support amendment 4. The parity in assistance envisioned by the amendment is unclear. Although kinship care assistance is a defined concept in legislation, there is no equivalent concept in respect of foster care. As drafted, the amendment would introduce a broad and undefined parity requirement that risks blurring the long-established distinction between kinship care as family-based care and foster care as a commissioned service, delivered on behalf of the state through formal arrangements. That could give rise to unintended legal, practical and financial consequences.In particular, amendment 4 does not distinguish between assistance intended to meet the cost of caring for a child and payments associated with foster care as a commissioned care service. Ministers already have the power to specify and require payment of allowance rates for foster and kinship carers, and we are strengthening that further through amendments 20 and 21, in a later group in relation to uprating and transparency. I consider that to be a more targeted and proportionate route to fairness. I hope that Jeremy Balfour agrees and will not press amendment 4. If he does, I encourage members to vote against it.Miles Briggs’s amendment 126 appears to align closely with the commitments that are set out in the draft kinship care vision statement. That vision emphasises the need for greater transparency, clearer local offers and improved access to information so that kinship carers are better able to understand and access the support that is available to them in their local areas and nationally. One purpose of the bill is to ensure that children and families with care experience feel supported, informed and empowered. Mr Briggs’s proposal contributes meaningfully to that aim. However, I seek to clarify what Mr Briggs intends in relation to local and national levels, and I would be happy to work with him to bring back a suitable alternative amendment to remedy that at stage 3.I encourage members to support my amendments 1, 2 and 3, and I move amendment 1.

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Education, Children and Young People Committee 04 February 2026 [Draft]

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