National Care Service: factsheet

Improvements we are making in the Bill

The National Care Service is moving forward with a revised approach including amended proposals for the Bill.  Stage 2 proceedings of the Bill have now concluded, and it was confirmed that the Bill will now be known as the Care Reform (Scotland) Bill. Whilst the Bill may no longer be called the National Care Service (Scotland) Bill, we are not stepping away from our ambitions of social care reform and a National Care Service.

Parts 2 and 3 of the Bill will still go ahead and you can find out more about our proposed reforms below.

Anne’s Law

We are recognising in law that spending time with loved ones is fundamental to the health and wellbeing of people living in care homes. We are calling this Anne’s Law. This will mean that if you are a resident of an adult care home, you can always connect with the people who are important to you. This is unless there are circumstances where there would be a serious risk to the life, health or wellbeing of people. 

Even where there are such circumstances, care homes should always support people to connect in some situations. For example, in end-of-life situations, or where pausing visits would cause serious harm to residents’ health or wellbeing.    

Anne’s Law recognises that some family and friends are not simply visitors, they are essential care supporters – an integral part of the care team for their loved ones. 

Anne’s Law gives formal recognition to their role in providing care, support and companionship, and helps ensure it will be prioritised when decisions are being made about safety and health.  

People will be able to choose at least one person as an Essential Care Supporter. This was called for by Care Home Relatives Scotland. It builds on other updates to the health and social care standards.   

Information sharing and standards

We know that information is not always shared between organisations and that sometimes people have to repeat their care needs to get the right support. We also know that staff who provide services can’t always access relevant information about the people they support. This means it can be difficult for people who work for different organisations to access consistent information.

We will establish a legal process (called a 'scheme') which will make it easier for information to be shared. This will make it less likely that people will have to repeat their information, and more likely staff will be able to provide the right level of care and support based on a complete understanding of needs. This includes when people might move or need different services.

Data isn't always easily accessible or held in the same way across different organisations. To address this, we are also creating the legal ability to set out consistent information standards across health and social care in Scotland. This will better connect our IT systems and data and make it easier for people to understand what data is held and how it is being used.

Rights to breaks for carers

The Care Reform (Scotland) Bill will include a new legal right to breaks for unpaid carers. When this becomes law, this will mean councils will have a duty to decide whether a carer is able to take sufficient breaks from their caring role; and if not, to provide support to enable this.

In the meantime, we are funding more short-break support. The 2025 to 2026 budget includes an extra £5 million to expand the voluntary sector short breaks fund. This will bring the total value of the fund to £13 million for 2025 to 2026. This means more carers can access the breaks they need.

This new legislation is delivering an action in our National Carers Strategy. 

Independent advocacy

We know how crucial independent advocacy is to the human-rights based approach of the NCS. We are committed to enhancing independent advocacy, independent information and independent advice as mechanisms to empower people to have their voices heard and participate fully in decisions about their care. We have been working with people with experience of accessing and delivering support to inform our approach.

Procurement

Reviews have shown the impact of procurement on the quality of services. They have also shown that we can improve consistency of practice.  We can make most of these improvements without legislative changes.

But the light-touch regime threshold is set in legislation. It determines when specific rules apply to purchasing of certain services, including social care services. This is still valuable. Through the Care Reform (Scotland) Bill we will provide a power to enable the Minister to change this threshold for health and social care services. Any future changes must still follow international laws.

Procurement in the third sector

We recognise the importance of the third sector and how hard it can be to compete for contracts. Through the Care Reform (Scotland) Bill, we will provide another procurement route for these organisations. This will be another tool public sector bodies can use when procuring community health and social care services. The decision to use this will be a local one.

Other procurement routes for independent sector businesses will be available. Services will still be delivered by public sector, independent sector and third sector organisations.