Care Leaver Payment – Guidance for Recipients

2. Who can get the payment?

You will be eligible to get the payment if:

(i) you were legally looked after (under section 17(6) of the Children (Scotland) Act 1995) on or after your 16^th birthday. This means if you were looked after in:

• Foster care (being looked after by a foster family);
• Residential care (being looked after away from home, often with other children or young people);
• Looked-after kinship care (where you were legally ‘looked after’ by your local authority and living with a family member or family friend);
• Secure care (a form of residential care that restricts the freedom of children under the age of 18. It is for the small number of children whose needs and risks can only be managed in a secure environment);
• Looked after at home (being looked after at home, but with regular visits from social workers to ensure that the objectives of a home supervision order are met);
• Adoptees (who were adopted after their 16^th birthday or where the adoption has broken down); and,
• Unaccompanied asylum-seeking young people (young people under the age of 18 who arrive in Scotland without parents or guardians); and

(ii) you left care or continuing care, on or after 1^st April 2026.

You will get the payment if you were looked after on or after your 16^th birthday, or left continuing care on or after 1^st April 2026.

If you left care or continuing care before 1^st April 2026 then you will not get the payment.