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Help for young people with experience of care

Your rights as young person with experience of care

Last updated
27 Oct 2025

Corporate parents

Corporate parents have a legal responsibility to support children and young people with experience of care.

They should ensure make these children and young people feel loved, cared for and respected.

Corporate parents include:

  • local councils – they employ people like social workers, housing officers and teachers
  • the NHS – they employ people like doctors, nurses and psychologists
  • colleges and universities – they employ people like lecturers and admissions support workers

You can find out more about corporate parents on Who Cares? Scotland.

There’s a full list of corporate parents in the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014 on GOV.UK.

Continuing care

Continuing care is staying with your family or carers until you’re 21, if it’s in your best interest.

You can stay with your carers or family until you’re 21 if you’re 16 or over and ‘looked after’ in:

  • foster care
  • kinship care
  • residential care

Learn about your right to continuing care at the Centre of Excellence for Children’s Care and Protection (CELCIS).

Aftercare

If you leave care after you’re 16 you can get help from your local council with:

  • housing
  • education
  • employment
  • financial assistance

This is called aftercare. You may be able to keep getting aftercare until you’re 26.

Your local council may be able to offer help beyond this age.

The Scottish Throughcare and Aftercare Forum has more information on the support you can get when transitioning from care.

Pathway Coordinator

When you’re preparing to leave care you should work with a Pathway Coordinator to work out what help you might need as a young adult. They might put together a document called a Pathway Plan. This will explain what help you will get and who will provide you support.

Young Person’s Supporter

A young person may ask to have someone to support them during the Pathway process. This is called a Young Person’s Supporter. You can ask your local council to suggest someone or pick someone yourself.

Siblings

A sibling can be:

  • your brother or sister
  • anyone you lived with and who you have a sibling-like relationship with

You might have a sibling-like relationship with:

  • a stepbrother or stepsister
  • a cousin
  • children who were looked after by the same foster parents as you

You can ask your local council to help you keep in contact with your siblings.

Additional support needs

If you have additional support needs you can use the Association for Real Change (ARC) Scotland's Compass tool to help you make choices about your future.

You can contact the Scottish Transitions Forum for advice.

You may be able to get support from the Independent Living Fund.

Legal advice and complaints

If you need to know more about your rights or how the law affects your rights you can contact the Clan Childlaw helpline.

If you're unhappy with care you're getting you can complain to the Care Inspectorate.

Get help from your local council

The Scottish Throughcare and Aftercare Forum (STAF) lists local council ‘care leaver offers’. These pages:

  • give information about support you might be able to get from your local council
  • have contact details for people who can help you get support

If you're unsure which council area you're in, you can search by postcode on GOV.UK.

If you need more help

If you need advice or support you can phone or email Who Cares? Scotland.

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