133. It is likely that the Bill establishing the Commission and the Council will be used as the legislative vehicle for a number of related issues. Details of these are given below.
Future work of the Social Work Services Inspectorate (SWSI)
134. SWSI operates under the Scottish Ministers’ powers of inspection in the Social Work (Scotland) Act 1968 which provide comprehensive powers in relation to establishments but less comprehensive powers in relation to other social work services. Much of the Inspectorate’s work is conducted on the basis of co-operation. In the future SWSI will develop further its programme of thematic inspections and an annual evaluation of the quality and performance of social work services across all authorities. The basis for this work will need to be provided for. The Inspectorate will also continue to investigate matters of concern when required and the legislation should provide a basis for conducting investigations into all service areas and the handling of individual cases when necessary.
Direct payments
135. The Scottish Executive propose to amend legislation to facilitate the extension of Direct Payment arrangements to include people aged 16 to 17 and parent carers of children with disabilities.
Extend authority to make payments
136. Section 10 of the Social Work (Scotland) Act 1968 empowers Scottish Ministers to make available grants to voluntary organisations and to other persons engaged in any activity connected with the functions of Scottish Ministers or the functions of local authorities under the 1968 Act and certain other enactments. It is not entirely clear that this power enables Ministers to make grants available to an organisation which then passes all or part of the grants on to other organisations or persons. We intend to clarify this in the forthcoming legislation.
Safeguarders
137. We also intend to clarify the provisions of section 101 of the Children (Scotland) Act 1995 concerning safeguarders. These provisions have not been implemented to date given the need to cover both expenses as well as fees and to permit the making of regulations to cover all 32 local authority panels of safeguarders and not a single panel for Scotland. These and related matters are currently the subject of a working group examining the procedures for appointing and making use of safeguarders. If relevant recommendations emerge from this group, additional amendments to the legislation may be considered in this area.
138. Children’s Hearings must consider in every case whether to appoint a safeguarder and must do so where there is, or might be, a conflict between the child’s interests and those of the parent(s). The safeguarder is appointed to safeguard the best interests of the child, a consequence of which will be to provide additional information not already before a Children’s Hearing, to assist the hearing in making a disposal. Where an appointment is considered necessary, the hearing is required to give reasons for such a decision. The safeguarder has only two specific duties:-
Throughcare and aftercare services
139. Scottish Ministers have announced that certain resources currently spent by DSS on benefits for care leavers should transfer to local authorities. A Scottish Executive-led working group will consider the detail of how such enhanced local authority funding might be best used for the advantage of these young people.
140. It is important to ensure an element of standardisation throughout Scotland from any proposals which emerge from the working group’s deliberations. Ministers propose therefore to amend the Children (Scotland) Act 1995 to permit better regulation for young people formerly looked after away from home by local authorities.
141. Ministers propose also to amend the 1995 Act to enable Scottish local authorities to provide aftercare support to an eligible young person from other parts of the United Kingdom. This parallels measures contained in the Care Leavers Bill currently before the Westminster Parliament in respect of authorities in England and Wales regarding support for young care leavers moving from Scotland.
Certification and registration of blind and partially sighted people
142. The specific obligation of local authorities to maintain a register of people who are blind or partially sighted was removed by the Social Work (Scotland) Act 1968. Advice at the time indicated that local authorities retained non-specific obligations to maintain such a register. A working group, established after the publication of Sensing Progress is currently reviewing the effectiveness of current registration arrangements. It has received representations to recommend re-instatement of the specific obligation to maintain a register, primarily because services to people with a visual impairment are closely linked to registration. The working group, due to complete its work next April, is likely to support these representations.