Children’s Hearings System: a brief introduction

In this talk Graham delivers an introduction to the Scottish Children’s Hearings System.

He provides some brief background about the origins of the System and how it came into being, the principles upon which it was founded, details of how the System works and who is involved in it, the most common reasons why children and young people may find themselves attending a Hearing, statistics concerning the numbers and types of cases the System is currently dealing with and finishes by reflecting upon some of the challenges the System faces as we move forwards.

All the material in the course was created prior to the publication of the Independent Care Review which was published in early 2020. The Children’s Hearing System was considered within this. In the final publications it was noted that “The Care Review has heard a variety of experiences of The Children’s Hearing System….some positive and others less so”. It went on to say that “Despite the difficulties of the system the Care Review has heard significant support for, and commitment to, the underlying principles of Kilbrandon that, when introduced in the 1960s, shifted Scottish children’s policy”. These will be issues that we can discuss more in the Live Stream Event on Friday 11 September.