INSIGHT
Care and
protection
Stella Perrott examines the contribution of the Children’s Hearings system to improving outcomes for children
I
n 1961 Lord Kilbrandon, a judge,
was appointed by the Secretary of
State for Scotland to lead a committee
“to consider the provisions of the law of
Scotland relating to the treatment of ju-
venile delinquents and juveniles in need
of care or protection or beyond parental
control”. The committee found that the
backgrounds and circumstances of those
children who came to the attention of
the courts were very similar, regardless
of the nature of the initial concern. In
most cases, the children had experienced
difficulties at home, in school and also in
their own development and behaviour.
The committee attributed childhood
difficulties to poor parental social educa-
tion, compounded by inadequate com-
pensatory education being provided by
schools and other agencies.
The report was published in 1964,
legislation was passed in 1968 and the
first Children’s Hearing sat in 1971. The
key Kilbrandon principles – a single
hearing within which both welfare and
offending would be addressed; the sepa-
ration of determining fact from deter-
mining treatment; a panel of lay mem-
bers to take decisions about treatment;
the involvement of the child and family
in decision making; and, the child being
the primary consideration of any deci-
sion were incorporated into the legisla-
tion and have survived in practice.
om
.c
Kilbrandon also sought a preventa-
tive and educative approach to address-
ing needs and envisaged a new ‘social
r
eamstime
education department’ to tackle a child’s
ier | D
‘defective social education’. He proposed
amk
the new department be located within
ael D
ik
the wider local authority education
© M
department and under its directorate.
24
| 15 December 2008 | Holyrood magazine | www.holyrood.com |
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