Voluntary care arrangements for children and families in Scotland banner

This page is for social workers and legal professionals to learn more about how to get involved in CELCIS's research on voluntary care arrangements in Scotland. Thank you for your interest!


About this research

We are interested in finding out more about voluntary care arrangements, created using Section 25 (s.25) of the Children (Scotland) Act 1995. Section 25 allows an arrangement in which parents agree to the local authority accommodating and caring for their child away from the family home. An initial exploration of voluntary care arrangements in Scotland by CELCIS in 2020 indicated that there is a lot of variation on how they are used across Scotland.

We are interested in speaking with social workers and legal professionals who have been involved in voluntary care arrangements. This includes:

  • Children and families social workers
  • Social work managers
  • Legal professionals

Everything that we learn from the study will be used by CELCIS and others to help ensure children and families receive the best care possible.

Please note, we have now completed our interviews and focus groups. Thank you to everyone who took part.

Need to speak to someone?

Please consider if a listening and helping service might be helpful for talking through how you are feeling and anything that you are find particularly hard in your life at the moment.

Breathing Space, a free, confidential, phone and webchat service is available for anyone in Scotland over the age of 16 to listen, offer advice, and provide information to them. Visit www.breathingspace.scot anytime, or phone 0800 83 85 87 Monday-Thursday 6pm - 2am, and Friday-Monday 6pm - 6am.

Return to main page
Return to Voluntary care arrangements for children page