Commentary on Sections Part 13 – Support for Kinship Care Section 71 – Assistance in relation to kinship care orders
181.Subsections (1) and (2) of section 71 provide that local authorities must make arrangements to ensure that kinship care assistance, which is assistance of such description as specified by the Scottish Ministers by order, is made available to those persons, living in its area, specified in subsection (3). Those persons specified in subsection (3) are: a person applying for, or considering applying for, a kinship care order in relation to an eligible child who has not attained the age of 16 years; an eligible child who has not attained the age of 16 years who is the subject of a kinship care order; a person in whose favour a kinship care order in relation to an eligible child who has not attained the age of 16 years subsists; a child who is 16 years old where, immediately before attaining the age of 16, the child was the subject of a kinship care order and where the child is still eligible; a person who is a guardian by virtue of an appointment under section 7 of the Children (Scotland) Act 1995 of an eligible child who has not attained the age of 16 years (but this is subject to subsection (4) which provides that this does not include a parent who is a guardian of an eligible child), and an eligible child who has a guardian by virtue of an appointment under section 7 of the 1995 Act.
182.Subsection (5) defines an “eligible child” as a child who the local authority considers to be at risk of becoming looked after, or who falls within such other description as the Scottish Ministers may by order specify.