Unaccompanied young people can claim asylum when reaching the UK and are entitled to support from local authorities as Unaccompanied Asylum-Seeking Children (UASC). These children and young people under 18 become the responsibility of the local authority where they present on arrival to the country which means the majority are looked after by the local authorities that are close to major points of entry into the UK. There are however spontaneous arrivals of UASC within Scotland who are supported by Scottish local authorities.
In order to ease pressure on those local authorities with the most arrivals, the UK Government mandated National Transfer Scheme (NTS)– a protocol which enables safe transfer of young people from the receiving local authorities to other regions in across the UK with significantly smaller numbers of UASC and young people in care. The NTS was mandated on 23 of November 2021 and all Scottish local authorities are playing their part.
COSLA, in its role as the Strategic Migration Partnership for Scotland manages the National Transfer Scheme for Scottish local authorities. COSLA supports local authorities in their work with UASCs more generally and continues work on a political and officer level to influence development of new policy, guidance and legislation and the impact these will have on Scottish Local Authorities and young people in their care.