School age childcare: a new legal definition

Overview

High quality childcare that is flexible, accessible and affordable plays a critical role in our society. It is vital to giving children the best possible start in life, to supporting families to thrive, and to ensuring that parents and carers can work, train or study.

The type of childcare needed by families will change over time depending on the age of the children and individual family circumstances. Broadly, there are two different types of childcare:

  • Early Learning and Childcare (ELC) covers care for younger children who haven’t yet started school. This can be babies, toddlers and also includes children who are receiving the funded 1140 hours.
  • School Age Childcare (SACC) covers care for older children who have reached school age. This childcare usually takes place before or after school, or during school holidays.

The Scottish Government wants to expand the school age childcare sector to make it easier for parents and carers to access the childcare they need. We plan to do this by making changes to the way in which the sector is regulated so that services can operate more sustainably.

The Scottish Government is now proposing to amend the definition of “daycare of children” in schedule 12 of the Public Services Reform (Scotland) Act 2010 and create a new separate definition for “school age childcare”. This consultation is asking for your views to help us develop the new definition.

Who will be affected by this proposal?

This consultation seeks views on a proposal to change the way that school age childcare is regulated. This means that these proposals will not apply to all childcare providers.

These proposals will apply to you if:

  • You are registered as a “day care of children” service and provide care to children of school age before or after school, or in the school holidays.
  • You are registered as a “day care of children” service and provide care to children of school age before or after school, or in the school holidays. And you also provide an ELC service for younger children.

These proposals will not apply to you if:

  • You are registered as a “day care of children” service and only provide ELC to younger children.
  • You are a childminder (even if you care for school age children).

Read the consultation paper. The consultation paper contains full background information for this consultation. You may find it useful to read or refer to while responding.

Consultation questions preview

The consultation questions are included here for your reference. Please click 'Begin consultation' at the bottom of this page to proceed.

Section 1: Developing a new definition

  1. Should a new definition for school age childcare also include play as well as care as part of the purpose of the service?
  2. What age range should be used in the new definition of school age childcare?
  3. Should a new definition for school age childcare include an exemption to regulation based on the number of hours a service operates for?
  4. If you currently provide both early learning and school age childcare as part of the same registration, would having to register under two separate categories change the type of service you offer?

Section 2: Impact Assessments

  1. Are there any examples or case studies you think we should look at when assessing the potential impacts of changing the definition?
  2. Are there any sources of data that you think would help us understand the impact of changing the definition of school age childcare?
  3. Are there any areas or groups that you think will be particularly affected by the change in definition?

Useful information about responding to this consultation

As you complete your response, each page will provide the option to 'Save and come back later' at the bottom. This means you can save your progress and return to the consultation at any time before it closes. If you don't use this feature and leave the consultation midway through, your response will be lost.

Once you have submitted your response, you can enter your email address to get a pdf copy of your answers sent to you.

On the 'About You' page at the end of this consultation, organisations will have the opportunity to tell us more about their work and/or how their response was informed.

After the consultation has closed there will be a few months delay before any responses are published. This is because we must check any responses to be published abide by our Terms of Use.

All relevant submitted responses will be analysed. This may be carried out by third party organisations who Scottish Government, its executive agencies or non-ministerial offices, contract to do this work. Such data sharing will be governed by appropriate contractual arrangements to keep your data secure.

An analysis report will usually be published some months after the consultation has closed. This report will summarise the findings based on all responses submitted. It will be published on the Scottish Government website and you may be notified about it if you choose to share your email address with us.

You can also join our consultation mailing list where we regularly list newly published analysis reports (as well as new consultations).

Why your views matter

The school age childcare sector has been raising concerns for a number of years about the way that they are regulated. This is an opportunity to be directly involved in developing a new legal definition and influence the way that services are regulated in future.

Give us your views

Begin consultation

Closes 18 May 2026

Opened 20 Feb 2026

Contact

Improving Access and Sector Growth

SACC_consultation@gov.scot

Interests

  • Children and Families
  • Economy
  • Education
  • Main hub