Questions over named person scheme in the Highlands

HIGHLAND Council is being urged to review its role in the SNP’s controversial "named person" policy that it helped pilot for the Scottish Government.

Opposition Conservative group leader Andrew Jarvie will propose at tomorrow’s full council meeting in Inverness that a rethink is timely with an imminent change of local authority’s care and learning directorship.

Current director Bill Alexander, an architect of the scheme in Highland, is due to retire later this year.

In a pre-submitted question to the director, Cllr Jarvie asked how the scheme operated and how it differed from what was ruled illegal by the Supreme Court.

The scheme, appointing a "named person" – a single point of contact such as a teacher or health visitor – to look out for the welfare of all children up to the age of 18, prompted widespread fury.

Ministers suffered a major setback when Supreme Court justices ruled in 2016 that parts of the policy were incompatible with the right to privacy and family life set out in the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR).

Scotland’s education secretary John Swinney was forced to halt the roll out of the scheme.

A Children and Young People (Information Sharing) (Scotland) Bill followed, in a bid to address the court’s concerns, with new rules requiring publication of a code of practice for professionals on how information should be shared.

In response to Cllr Jarvie’s question, Mr Alexander stated that the "Highland practice model" including a named person for each child had "been in place for many years, pre-dating the introduction of a legislative basis for the model".

He stated: "The Scottish Government sought to incorporate a version of this model into legislation. The Supreme Court determined that ministers needed to provide greater clarity about the basis on which health visitors, teachers and other professionals supporting families will share and receive information in their named person role."

Cllr Jarvie claimed the entire process remains clouded in confusion.

He said: "A lot of people have asked me questions on this. What I had received was only contradictory. The council says its scheme is different, so it’s not subject to the court ruling. But then the Scottish Government were saying the Highland scheme is so similar that they must be able to run it."

He added: "In an era of declining resources, we’re spreading our resources very thin instead of targeting them at the right children."

Meanwhile, opposition politicians are demanding Highland Council picks up the pace on tackling our crumbling roads and critical need for new infrastructure to cater for an ever-rising tide of tourists.

Inverness SNP councillor Ron MacWilliam will press the point at Thursday’s meeting.

In an initial response from planning chairman Allan Henderson, he has been told the council agreed to invest an extra £2.7 million per year in 2016 for roads maintenance from the council’s capital budget.

"During the review of the capital programme in March, this increased sum was maintained at its current level of £7.2 million per year for the next five years," Mr Henderson stated. "When agreeing the capital programme in March, an additional £1 million was brought forward from 2019-20 to help address some of the damage from the 2017-18 winter, increasing the investment to £8.2 million this year."

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