Children’s Hearings (Scotland) Act 2011

76. Subsection (2)(a) provides for situations of inadequate parenting on the part of the person who has parental care of the child. A lack of care may arise in a wide variety of ways and may be the outcome of the parent’s actions, such as emotional abuse, or of the parent’s omissions, as in neglect. The lack of parental care may result from a parent’s intentional or unintentional behaviour and could be a consequence of a parent’s alcohol or drug abuse, mental ill-health, limited ability or lack of parenting skills. Subsection (2)(a) can be applied on the basis of past or present incidents of lack of parental care but such lack of care needs to link to the impact on the child’s health or development, or may be a cause of the child’s suffering. The lack of care may relate to another child, but it is the likely impact on the child to which the ground(s) applies that needs to be considered. The ground(s) can be used to protect a new-born child joining the household where there is evidence of a lack of care towards other children or the lack of care can be drawn by inference from the parent’s lifestyle or capacity.