The National Assistance (Assessment of Resources) Amendment (Scotland) (No. 2) Regulations 2022

EXPLANATORY NOTE

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

These Regulations amend the National Assistance (Assessment of Resources) Regulations 1992 (“the principal Regulations”). The principal Regulations concern the assessment of the ability of a person to pay for accommodation provided under the Social Work (Scotland) Act 1968 (“the 1968 Act”). By virtue of section 87(3) of the 1968 Act, accommodation provided under the 1968 Act or section 25 of the Mental Health (Care and Treatment) (Scotland) Act 2003 is to be regarded as accommodation provided under Part III of the National Assistance Act 1948.

Schedule 4 of the principal Regulations sets out categories of capital which must be disregarded in the financial assessment of the persons resources.

Regulation 2 amends schedule 4 of the principal Regulations to add four additional categories of capital:

• Any payment made under or by an infected blood payment scheme established by, or under arrangements made with, the Scottish Ministers, the Secretary of State, the Welsh Ministers or the Department of Health in Northern Ireland for making ex gratia payments to or in respect of persons who have acquired HIV or hepatitis C as a result of treatment with blood or blood products within the national health service.

• Any payments which would have been disregarded under regulation 26 (disregard of payments and lump sums for certain purposes) of the Victims’ Payments Regulations 2020.

• Any compensation payment made under Part 1 (the Historical Institutional Abuse Redress Board) of the Historical Institutional Abuse (Northern Ireland) Act 2019.

• Payments to a former child migrant made from the scheme established by Her Majesty’s Government for former British child migrants in response to the Investigation Report on Child Migration Programmes by the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse published on 1 March 2018.