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Publication - Consultation paper

New legal definition for school age childcare: consultation

Published
20 February 2026
From
Minister for Children, Young People and The Promise
Directorate
Children and Families Directorate
Topic
Children and families, Economy, Education
ISBN
9781806437382

This consultation is seeking views and information that will support work to explore potential changes to the regulation of school age childcare services by creating a new legal definition for school age childcare.

Open
24 days to respond
Respond online

Closes
18 May 2026
View supporting documents Supporting documents

Sector analysis

The Care Inspectorate publishes annual data on the number of childcare services that are registered with them. By reviewing the data for SACC services between 2014 and 2024 (the most recent year for which data is available) we can see that there has been a marked decline in the number of services (see figure 1), particularly since 2018 when there were just over 100 more SACC services registered than in 2024.

Figure 1 - Number of registered school age childcare services in Scotland: 2014-2024
Figure 1. A line graph utilising Care Inspectorate data to show the changes in the number of registered school age childcare services in Scotland across the period from 2014 to 2024, the most recent year for which data is available. This graph demonstrates that there was an upwards trend from 703 registered services in 2014 to 748 registered services in 2018, the highest number of registered services recorded. The graph then indicates a marked decline with 640 registered services in 2024.

We have been working closely with the SACC sector to understand the reasons for service closures and the things which are making it difficult to run their businesses. We know that many services have been affected by the impact of the covid pandemic and changes in working patterns which have led to changes in demand for childcare. However we know there are also a range of other issues and that many of these are related to current regulatory requirements for SACC services.

Contact

Email: sacc_consultation@gov.scot

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