Visitor Levy (Amendment) (Scotland) Bill: child rights and wellbeing impact assessment

Introduction

The Visitor Levy (Amendment) (Scotland) Bill seeks to make changes to an existing piece of legislation, the Visitor Levy (Scotland) Act 2024 (“the 2024 Act”) to give councils flexibility to set up a visitor levy scheme in their areas using a fixed amount (or amounts) model as an alternative to the current percentage-based model provided for in the 2024 Act. Currently, councils can decide to introduce a percentage-based charge on overnight accommodation to support services and facilities that visitors use; this is called a visitor levy scheme. The liable person is the accommodation provider, although it is anticipated that they may pass on the cost of the levy to the visitor.

The Visitor Levy (Amendment) (Scotland) Bill would allow councils to decide to introduce a fixed amount of levy based on the number of nights of their stay or the number of people staying in the accommodation each night of the stay instead of a percentage-based model. This gives councils more flexibility over how they design a visitor levy scheme so that it meets the needs of their local area. It is important that the impacts of these different models on children and young people are considered in relation to this Bill and once schemes are up and running.

It is up to each council to decide whether they want to introduce a visitor levy scheme or not. If a council decides they want to introduce one, they must make sure that any decisions they take about the scheme consider the impacts on everyone in their area, including children and young people under section 6 of the UNCRC (Incorporation) (Scotland) Act 2024 (“the UNCRC Act”).

The 2024 Act also gave councils the power to introduce local exemptions for different groups of people if they decide that is a good thing to do. Some councils may decide that children and young people should, where the cost of the levy is passed on to visitors, not be liable to pay a visitor levy. Although this is a decision that can only be made by individual councils.

This Bill also makes some changes to the 2024 Act to fix some technical points regarding different booking models that came to light once councils started to implement visitor levy schemes in their areas and ensures that the 2024 Act works as intended.

Start date of proposal’s development: October 2025

Start date of CRWIA process: November 2025