RUTH Davidson has urged the Scottish Government to drop its controversial named person scheme, calling the latest attempt to make it legally watertight “deeply flawed”.
The Scottish Conservative leader told Nicola Sturgeon at First Minister’s Questions it would be better to “start again with a blank sheet of paper” on child protection.
Ms Davidson warned health workers and teachers who would become named persons, reporting concerns about vulnerable children, could find themselves in a “legal minefield”.
She cited the Faculty of Advocates warning that named persons would need to weigh complex arguments on whether sharing sensitive information between public bodies was proportionate, and it could be “damned if you do, damned if you don’t”.
The Scottish Government’s plan is to have health visitors, teachers and other professionals act as a single point of contact to advise on the welfare of all children.
However last year the UK Supreme Court ruled elements of the law were ''incompatible'' with a right to privacy and family life under the European Convention on Human Rights.
The Government has now introduced new legislation to address the problem, the Children and Young People (Information Sharing) (Scotland) Bill.
Instead of a duty to share information which could support, promote or safeguard the wellbeing of a child, there would be a duty to consider whether to share that information.
However Ms Davidson said the repair attempt remained flawed.
She said: "After five years of debating this back and forward here is where we are at - a second attempt of legislation that even supporters say is flawed, that legal experts say is confused and that teachers and health workers warn will be an enormous burden on them.
“It's been clear to these [Tory] benches for years that the named person scheme as designed simply won't work but we have a Scottish Government that is simply ploughing ahead with it."
Ms Sturgeon said she had confidence in the Bill, and it was a standard Bills might be improved.
She also criticised Ms Davidson for talking mostly about the politics of the scheme, and only belatedly about the “vulnerable children… at the centre of this."
She said: “The Supreme Court did not uphold the view of the Scottish Conservatives that the named person scheme in principle was illegal. What it did was point to what it saw as problems and flaws with the information sharing provisions.
"This Bill is about rectifying those flaws. We're at the start of a legislative process.
“At the end of that we intend that we will have rectified the issues highlighted by the Supreme Court but also have in place a system that has as its central purpose - and let's none of us lose sight of that - the greater protection of vulnerable children."
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