Almost two-thirds of Scots are opposed to the controversial Named Person scheme, a new poll by the Scottish Daily Mail has found.
According to the poll, 64 per cent of Scots believe the scheme, which appoints a state guardian to every child from before birth up to age 18, is an “unacceptable intrusion into family life”.
Fewer than one in five people (18.5 per cent) thought the scheme was not intrusive.
Legal challenge
Responding to the poll results Simon Calvert, spokesman for the No To Named Persons campaign, said: “This confirms the growing view that the Named Person is unwanted, unworkable and undemocratic.
“The more the public hears about the Named Person, the less they like it. The Government has lost the argument.”
Almost 50 per cent of those asked said it is wrong “for every child to be assigned a Named Person to monitor their wellbeing”.
The news comes as judges at the UK Supreme Court consider a legal challenge to the Scottish Government’s plans, brought by groups including The Christian Institute.
Questions
A ruling against the Named Person scheme could put a halt to it ahead of its scheduled full implementation in August this year.
Last week, commentators questioned whether the Named Person scheme had some bearing on the tragic death of toddler Liam Fee.
Two-year-old Liam was murdered by his mother Rachel Trelfa and her civil partner Nyomi Fee in one of the most harrowing cases of abuse ever seen in Scotland.
Laurie Matthew, of anti-bullying and abuse charity 18 and Under, highlighted that Liam was known to the authorities and had “a named person of sorts”, but still “slipped through the cracks”.
Haystack
Over the weekend, the Sunday Express revealed that in recent years minutes from the Child Protection Committee in Fife – the area where Liam lived – have been dominated by the implementation of new Government policy, including the Named Person scheme.
A few weeks before the toddler’s death, Fife’s leading child protection nurse warned that new policy was causing a “delay in development of the Child Protection service”.
Speaking to the Express, Dr Gordon MacDonald of CARE for Scotland, said: “While it is important to find out what went wrong in this specific case, they have got to look at the wider context of the Named Person reforms.
“They have created a huge amount of extra work without resourcing it properly and the danger of making the haystack so big is that you don’t catch the needle.”
Vote
The Scottish Conservatives will trigger a debate on the Named Person scheme tomorrow.
To read more about the plans, visit the Named Person scheme page on our website.