Welcome to the February 2026 edition of the Bairns’ Hoose newsletter!
In this issue we shall be covering:
Updates from the Scottish Government Bairns’ Hoose Unit and project team:
- Bairns’ Hoose Fund
- Children and young people’s engagement
- Analysis
- Changes to pre-recorded evidence for children in the Sheriff Court
January 2026 meeting of the National Bairns’ Hoose Implementation Group
Knowledge Exchange Webinar Programme 2026
March Collaborative Learning Event
The UK Government announces the expansion of the Child House model to cover all NHS regions in England
The Bairns’ Hoose Unit looks forward to Shetland visit
Research Spotlight: Understanding Supervision in Bairns’ Hoose Practice
Updates from the Scottish Government Bairns’ Hoose Unit and project team
Bairns’ Hoose Fund
Supporting the continued development and delivery of Bairns’ Hoose across Scotland, the Bairns’ Hoose Fund 2026-2027 opened for applications on 23 January, with the application period running until 17 February. An indicative £9 million has been made available for partnerships to apply for, subject to Parliamentary budget approval.
The Fund, administered by Impact Funding Partners (IFP), currently supports a range of partnerships through three funding streams:
- Pathfinder Fund providing grant support to the six Bairns’ Hoose Pathfinder partnerships
- Affiliate Fund supporting four Bairns’ Hoose Affiliate partnerships
- Development Fund offering smaller grants to partnerships at earlier stages of their Bairns’ Hoose journey.
In addition, all partnerships are able to apply for Test of Change funding to support short term, innovative projects that contribute to national learning and help inform the development of the National Bairns’ Hoose model.
Children and Young People Engagement
The National Bairns’ Hoose Standards set out clear expectations that children and young people, alongside their families, are supported to contribute to discussions and decisions that affect them. As a key requirement for Bairns’ Hoose funding, partnerships must demonstrate how the Lundy model of participation is embedded within local service delivery and aligns with these Standards.
The Lundy model provides a clear and practical framework to support meaningful participation. It enables practitioners, including Bairns’ Hoose link workers, to ensure that children and young people have time, space and appropriate opportunities to express their views, and that those views are listened to, given due weight, and acted upon. This approach moves participation beyond consultation, supporting children’s voices to directly inform service design, decision-making and outcomes within Bairns’ Hoose.
Throughout 2026, partnerships will continue to design, test and refine locally adaptable delivery models in preparation for national roll-out from 2027. During this development phase, the Bairns’ Hoose link worker role provides a key opportunity to engage children and young people as partners in shaping the model, ensuring that their experiences and perspectives are embedded from the outset.
On Monday 2 February 2026, Bairns’ Hoose link workers came together to reflect on participation and engagement priorities for the year ahead. The session provided an opportunity to share learning, identify collective priorities, and highlight recent examples of participation and engagement activity taking place across partnerships.
Discussion focused on the key role link workers will have in ensuring the voice of children and young people remains central to the development of Bairns’ Hoose Core Elements, National Bairns’ Hoose Guidance and supportive Resource kit.
While it was acknowledged that partnerships are at varying stages of development, each partnership acknowledged the importance of early involvement of children and young people and committed to supporting this key area of work during 2026.
Each partnership shared examples of how they are actively seeking the views and reflections of children and young people, which included local primary school children, youth and Changemakers groups designing unique Bairns’ Hoose logos and branding, naming buildings and supporting the design of physical spaces, leaflets and videos.
Analysis
Ipsos will present findings from their research on the Pathfinder phase in two webinars, on 5 February and 21 May 2026. The final report will be published in June 2026, following the Scottish election.
On the Bairns’ Hoose indicators project, Scottish Government analysts have reviewed the feedback received and developed a shorter list of core indicators to monitor implementation of the programme across Scotland. These indicators aim to create a consistent national data picture to inform policy and stakeholders about implementation progress and priority areas for improvement. They will also form the baseline for the evaluation of the national roll out planned from 2027. Analysts will arrange meetings with partnerships and other stakeholders from February to May 2026 to discuss the list of indicators.
Changes to pre-recorded evidence for children in the Sheriff Court
In our November 2025 newsletter we highlighted the next phase of rollout of the Vulnerable Witnesses (Criminal Evidence) (Scotland) Act 2019. The Act introduced a presumption that children and vulnerable adult witnesses in the most serious cases should be able to pre-record their evidence ahead of a trial, to avoid having to give their evidence live in court wherever possible.
The next phase of the rollout of the provisions of the Act will extend the presumption to children aged under 16 in the most serious cases in the Sheriff Court. We are working to bring forward provisions to ensure that the presumption will apply to qualifying cases calling petition on or after the 30 March 2026. In cases where no accused appears on petition, cases will qualify where the indictment is served on any accused in the proceedings on or after 30 December 2026.
The Scottish Government has delivered £2.5 million of funding to Scottish Courts and Tribunal Services to support the provision of additional Evidence by Commissioner facilities in sheriffdoms across Scotland. A cross-sectoral Implementation Group is taking forward the work required to ensure readiness across the criminal justice system ahead of the next phase of the rollout, and the Vulnerable Witnesses Act Implementation Plan sets out the schedule for the subsequent phases of the delivery of the Act.
If you have any further questions please get in touch with the team via email: Bairnshoose@gov.scot
January 2026 meeting of the National Bairns’ Hoose Implementation Group (NBHIG)
The NBHIG held its fifth meeting on 20 January 2026. The Minister for Children, Young People and the Promise, Natalie Don-Innes, confirmed that Bairns’ Hoose remains a firm priority across Education, Justice and Health portfolios and funding for the Bairns’ Hoose programme is expected to continue in the 2026-27 financial year, subject to Parliamentary approval of the Scottish Budget.
The group was joined by members of the North Strathclyde and Outer Hebrides partnerships who shared insights and learning from their journeys to implement Bairns’ Hoose. North Strathclyde spoke about the role of the Procurator Fiscal within their Bairns’ Hoose and their aim to ensure children are no longer involved in court proceedings. Outer Hebrides spoke to the opportunities and challenges of implementing Bairns’ Hoose in a rural location. They shared progress on the development of their physical site and the importance of considering recovery within the whole system approach to Bairns’ Hoose.
The Scottish Government Bairns’ Hoose Unit shared updated plans for development of National Guidance and a supplementary resource kit, which will be drafted throughout the course of 2026 and published in 2027. The delivery of these will mark a significant milestone in the Pathfinder phase and help us draw together the learning and insights of our partnerships as we move into the incremental roll out of Bairns’ Hoose nationwide.
The next meeting of the group will be in person on Thursday 11 June 2026.
Knowledge Exchange Webinar Programme 2026
We have an exciting programme of sessions planned to take us to Spring 2026. To sign up for sessions, please follow the links below:
- 24 February: Spotlight session on North Strathclyde Bairns’ Hoose Partnership
- 10 March: Collaborative Learning Event
- 26 March: Spotlight session on Lanarkshire Bairns’ Hoose Development Partnership
We have received positive feedback on the suite of events within the 2025/26 programme. Work is underway to build the next programme of events. These will also incorporative learning events with our partnerships that support the development of national guidance.
March Collaborative Learning Event
We look forward to hosting the next in-person Bairns’ Hoose National Collaborative Learning Event on Tuesday 10 March 2026, 10:00 to 16:30 at Paisley Town Hall. The event offers a great opportunity to engage with partners, explore key developments and strengthen collaboration across our Partnerships.
Partnerships will have the chance to come together to share experiences, insights, learning and connections that support the delivery of Bairns’ Hoose across Scotland. During the event we will hear from Anna Uwagboe, The Lighthouse in London, about taking a holistic health approach through the mind, body and soul approach. Kate Fernando and Louise Mitchell, Tayside Pathfinder Partnership, and Jennifer Morrison and Anne Marie McRae, National Joint Investigative Interview Team, will demonstrate the contribution of speech and language therapy in Bairns’ Hoose. Finally, Mary Mitchell and Camille Warrington, University of Edinburgh, will explore the meaning of therapeutic support and recovery in Bairns’ Hoose. There will also be time for discussion during an un-conference session.
Registration opened on Wednesday 21 February. Due to popular demand, spaces are now limited. If you would like to secure a place, we recommend registering as soon as possible. If you have any questions, please contact bairnshoose@gov.scot.
The UK Government announces the expansion of the Child House model to cover all NHS regions in England
In December 2025 the UK Government announced the expansion of the Child House model to cover all NHS regions in England. The model, influenced by the Scandinavian Barnahus meaning child’s house, brings multi-agency support spanning justice, health and advocacy to support children affected by sexual abuse.
We welcome the UK Government’s recognition of the Barnahus model as a child-centred, trauma-informed approach to supporting children and young people affected by abuse and violence. We look forward to sharing learning from Scotland’s Pathfinder Phase with UK Government colleagues as they develop proposals to visit some Bairns’ Hoose sites during 2026.
The Bairns’ Hoose Unit looks forward to Shetland visit
The Bairns’ Hoose Unit is pleased to be visiting Shetland on 10 and 11 February for a two day event supporting local partners as they shape Shetland’s emerging approach and vision for Bairns’ Hoose.
Our team, including policy, a Health Professional Advisor, and an Improvement Advisor, will contribute to discussions on Scotland’s approach to Bairns’ Hoose, integrating health into Bairns’ Hoose and will support facilitation as partners work together to develop a shared vision.
Across the two days, the programme will also explore children and young people’s engagement, learning from practice in other areas, insights into implementing the Scottish Child Interview Model and strengthening interagency decision making.
Research Spotlight: Understanding Supervision in Bairns’ Hoose Practice
As part of our ongoing commitment to strengthening the implementation of Scotland’s Bairns’ Hoose model, we are pleased to highlight a new research study exploring how social workers understand and experience supervision across Bairns’ Hoose Pathfinder and Affiliate sites.
This work is being undertaken by Hannah Polson, a master’s student in Applied Professional Studies (Social Work) at the University of Stirling. Drawing on twelve years of frontline children and families practice and current experience within a Bairns’ Hoose implementation role, Hannah’s study focuses on the critical role of supervision as a driver of highquality, traumainformed and rightsbased practice.
The study, ‘Conceptualising Social Work Supervision in Multi-Agency Child Protection: Insights from Scotland’s Bairns’ Hoose Sites’, aims to build a deeper understanding of what supervision means to social workers working within or alongside Bairns’ Hoose sites. The objectives of the study are to:
- explore how social workers understand the role and purpose of supervision
- explore how social workers experience and conceptualise supervision in practice across Bairns’ Hoose sites
- understand how supervision supports trauma-informed and recovery-focused ways of working
- identify what helps or hinders effective supervision in multi-agency settings
- provide insights to inform the ongoing development of supervision frameworks within Bairns’ Hoose sites
Invitation to Participate
The research is currently seeking social workers who:
- work within a Bairns’ Hoose Pathfinder or Affiliate site, or
- work alongside a Bairns’ Hoose Pathfinder or Affiliate site, as part of wider multiagency practice
Participants are invited to take part in a 45minute onetoone interview via Microsoft Teams. Interviews will explore your experiences and views of supervision in your role. Participation is voluntary, and all information will be treated in accordance with UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018.
If you would like further information or wish to participate, please contact Hannah Polson at: hab00125@students.stir.ac.uk or on 07585 603469.