Seòmar agus comataidhean

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-22502 on 8 November 2023. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers .

At the present time, the Scottish Government collects and maintains data annually in respect of Child Protection in Scotland. This data is collected and published as part of the annual Children’s Social Work Statistics Official Statistics publication. Each Scottish Local Authority is asked to submit a return providing information on the children who were involved in the Child Protection process during the year. This includes the following information on Child Protection.

1. Number of Child Protection Investigations and outcomes of the investigation.

2. Number of Child Protection Case Conferences (also known as Child Protection Planning Meetings). This includes the type of Case conference (i.e. Pre-Birth, Initial, Review, Transfer In) and the type of concern(s) identified at the Case Conference (e.g. domestic abuse, parental substance misuse). This also includes the child's primary known/suspected abuser at the time of the Case Conference.

3. Number of children on the Child Protection Register.

4. Number of Child Protection registrations and de-registrations.

5. Sociodemographic details on each child involved in any of the above (age; gender; ethnic group; religion; disability).

In addition to this, the Children and Families Analysis Team also collects and publishes monthly Management Information data in respect of Child Protection in Scotland. This data is collected and published as part of the monthly Vulnerable Children and Adult Monitoring Report data collection and publication. This includes the following information on Child Protection concerns and interventions:

1. Number of child protection concerns and child wellbeing concerns.

2. Number of inter-agency referral discussions.

3. Number of children on the Child Protection Register.

4. Number of Child Protection registrations and de-registrations.

5. Number of registrations where domestic abuse was recorded as a significant factor.

6. Number of referrals to the Reporter on offence and non-offence grounds.

7. Number of arrange Hearing decisions and number of Hearings held.

8. Number of Compulsory Supervision Orders granted.

The Creative Digital Initiative was a £1 million national programme which ran from April 2021 to the end of March 2022 to help the sector develop digital capabilities in response to the limitations imposed by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Led by Creative Scotland and involving all the national enterprise and skills agencies as well as the Scottish Government, the programme provided support to small and medium-sized creative and cultural businesses to help them continue to build their digital capacity and provide the tools needed to respond to the limitations they currently face. This included financial support to build digital capacity as well as practical help to increase confidence, provide new creative opportunities and mentor artists and cultural organisations.

As stated in our Culture Strategy Action Plan, enabling the creative workforce to keep pace with continuing digital innovation is a priority. We will consider learning from the Creative Digital Initiative to support the development of a skilled and resilient creative workforce and meet the needs of the future.

The term additional support needs under the Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Act 2004 (the 2004 Act) applies where for whatever reason children or young people are unable to benefit from school education without the provision of additional support. Therefore, the information requested in relation to colleges and universities is not applicable. In addition, the information requested on current average waiting times is not held centrally.

To support children, young people and families, the Scottish Government has invested in a range of additional supports – including providing councils with an additional £30 million over the last two years to fund community mental health and wellbeing supports. Local authorities have reported that these supports have benefitted over 38,000 children, young people, parents and carers in the first six months of 2022 alone.

Record high investments in CAMHS, including £48.6 million of supplementary funding to health boards this year, are helping to improve the quality and delivery of mental health services to ensure all children and young people receive the right support, at the right time.

The term additional support needs under the Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Act 2004 applies where for whatever reason children or young people are unable to benefit from school education without the provision of additional support. Therefore, the information requested in relation to colleges and universities is not applicable.

In 2021, we published a Whole School Approach Framework to assist in supporting children and young people’s mental health in schools. This complements earlier work to provide a professional learning resource to support school staff.

We also continue to support local authorities with £16 million a year to ensure that every secondary school has access to counselling services, which are now in place across Scotland. School counselling is just one of a range of services that schools may have in place to support the health, emotional and social needs of young people.

The term additional support needs under the Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Act 2004 (the 2004 Act) applies where for whatever reason children or young people are unable to benefit from school education without the provision of additional support. Therefore, the information requested in relation to colleges and universities is not applicable.

An additional support need may not be permanent and does not require a diagnosis. There is a wide spectrum of support that may be needed, from support to overcome barriers arising from health or disability to support for social and emotional reasons, therefore, each child or young person’s needs are unique.

Under the 2004 Act appropriate agencies have a duty to help an education authority discharge their duties unless the help asked for:

• Is incompatible with the agency's statutory or other duties; or
• unduly prejudices the agency in its discharge of its own functions.

For the purposes of the Act, an appropriate agency can be any NHS Board. Therefore, education authorities may make a request to an NHS Board, that a child or young person receives speech or language therapy or attends occupational therapy, where appropriate.

On counselling, local authorities provide six-monthly joint reports to the Scottish Government on both access to counsellors in secondary schools and children and young people’s community mental health services.

The most recently published information (3 November 2022) can be found at the following link:

Access to counsellors in secondary schools and children and young people’s community mental health services: summary report - July to December 2021 - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

The 2021-22 Programme for Government included a commitment to invest £4 million until March 2024 to support public services to consistently uphold children's rights. The financial memorandum that accompanied the original UNCRC Bill set out how that would be spent and included commitments to invest in: accessible guidance and training; awareness-raising to support children and young people to be human rights defenders; a sustainable approach to the strategic participation of children and young people in decision-making; a social marketing campaign to raise the profile and support for children’s rights across Scottish society; and support for public services and senior leaders to progressively realise the rights of children.

While the social media campaign could not be progressed due to the delay to the UNCRC Bill, all of the other support is either in place or in development.

Our investment in supporting the implementation of a children’s human rights approach has been £4,117,974 in 2021-22, £5,022,545 in 2022-23 and is currently forecast to be £5,121,064 in 2023-24. This includes the cost of:

• work to progress the UNCRC (Incorporation) (Scotland) Bill and develop supporting guidance;
• grant funding of organisations that are supporting public authorities to take a children’s human rights approach (Scottish Youth Parliament, Children’s Parliament, Together, Young Scot and the Improvement Service)
• grant funding of organisation that help children and young people to seek redress for rights issues (Clan Childlaw and Scottish Child Law Centre);
• grant funding of organisations delivering on children’s rights through the Children, Young People and Families Early Intervention Fund
• national funding of Unicef’s Rights Respecting School Award;
• the development of a child-friendly complaints process in partnership with the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman;
• the UNCRC innovation fund that is funding 8 local authorities and their partners to embed children’s rights; and
• the development of a national children’s rights skills and knowledge framework.