Children's Social Work Statistics, Scotland 2020-21

Secure Care Accommodation

Bed complement

There were 84 beds available in five secure units in Scotland for children and young people under the age of 18 (Table 3.1). This remains unchanged from the previous year. All units, with the exception of Edinburgh Secure Services, reported having at least one emergency or short-term use bed.

^[1] Excluding emergency or short-term respite beds

Capacity and usage

The average number of residents decreased to 76 from 82 in the previous year.

↓ The average number of nights that emergency beds were used was 40 –a significant decrease from 209 since the previous year.

↓ The number of residents using emergency beds was 17 – a decrease from 28 in the previous year.

↓ The average number of residents from within Scotland decreased to 47, while residents from outside Scotland (i.e. England and Wales) increased slightly to 29.

^[1] Capacity: Young people can be admitted and discharged more than once during the year.

^[2] Four units reported having at least one emergency/ short term bed: Rossie School; Good Shepherd; Kibble; and St. Mary's Kenmure (see background notes for definition of an emergency bed).

^[3] The large drop in the use of emergency beds may have partly been due to a decrease in average occupancy rates and/or impacts of COVID-19.

Resident characteristics and length of stay

56% of residents were male

44% of residents were female

72% of residents were over the age of 15

23% of residents had at least one disability

Table 3.3: Young people in secure care accommodation by sex, age, disability and length of stay, 2014-2021^[1]

^[1] As at 31 July of each year.

^[2] Trans, intersex and non-binary individuals are grouped with males for the purposes of maintaining confidentiality.

* Cells represent numbers that are suppressed to maintain confidentiality.

Cross-UK comparisons

Cross UK comparisons for Secure Care Accommodation data for Scotland, England, and Wales can be found in Table 3.4.

Table 3.4: Secure children's homes/units, places approved, and children accommodated at year end across the UK, 2014-2021

^[1] Source for England and Wales: Statistics: secure children’s homes

Please note that the legal routes into secure care can vary between the UK countries.

^[2] For Northern Ireland, official/national statistics are not produced on secure care accommodation

^[3] The figures from outside Scotland include children placed on welfare grounds only.

^[4] Please note that Scotland totals may include young people who are from elsewhere in the UK. Similarly, the totals for England and Wales may include some children from other parts of the UK – these numbers are not published separately.

^[5] To allow for comparison with England and Wales Scotland's data within this table is 'at 31 March' for all years with the exception of 2020 for which it is 'at 29 February'.