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Human rights requirements lie behind Adult Support and Protection legislation and policy in Scotland. The European Convention on Human Rights sets out each Article in full.

This section of the Scottish Government website details national Adult Support and Protection policy. It explains the features of the Adult Support and Protection system in Scotland (including Learning Reviews, Adult Protection Committees and the inspection programme). There are links to policy documents, including the improvement plan, alongside other key resources.

Self-evaluation is central to continuous improvement. This guide supports care services to reflect on what they are currently doing. This will help them understand where to target efforts to support improvement, and when to build on what's working well.

The three stages to self-evaluation set out in the guide are:

These are the findings of a rapid evidence review of the international literature, published between 2016-2022, on trauma-informed working. The review describes the enablers that support the effective implementation of trauma-informed approaches across different systems, organisations and workforces, as well as the barriers.

Details, including terms of reference and minutes of past meetings, of the trauma responsive social work services partnership delivery group. The aim of the group is to implement the national trauma training programme for social work services. The group provides advice, informs, shares and progresses actions in its workplan. This will help to ensure Scotland’s social work services are trauma-informed, and improve outcomes for people affected by trauma.

A website providing access to evidence-based training, tools and guidance to support trauma-informed and responsive systems, organisations and workforces in Scotland. It aims to support everyone, in all sectors of the workforce, to know how to adapt the way they work to make a positive difference to anyone who has been impacted by psychological trauma and adversity.

This roadmap has been designed to help services and organisations identify and reflect on progress, strengths and opportunities for embedding a trauma-informed and responsive approach across policy and practice. It is based on evidence, learning and good practice from the Scottish context alongside existing relevant Scottish frameworks and guidance. It draws extensively on what people with lived experience of trauma have said would help improve access to support, reduce re-traumatisation, recognise resilience and support recovery.

Trauma-informed practice is grounded in and directed by a complete understanding of how trauma exposure affects a person's neurological, biological, psychological and social development. For trauma survivors, trauma-informed services can bring hope, empowerment and support that is not re-traumatising. Trauma-informed practice is informed by neuroscience, psychology and social science as well as attachment and trauma theories. This toolkit uses trauma-informed principles, identifying concrete examples of trauma-informed practice across a wide variety of settings.

The principle that we learn from failure is important to learning and improving, and is a central reflection point when thinking about risk. However, the fear of failure remains strongly embedded in social care culture. When thinking about risk and risk assessment in Adult Support and Protection, over-cautious practice may reduce creativity and innovation. It may even act as a barrier to promoting outcomes that an adult at risk wants. This resource encourages thinking about risk in a holistic way, including considering the risk inherent in maintaining the status quo.

This resource, from the Adult Protection Shared Learning Initiative, presents a set of formats and standards intended to be used as part of a broader assessment and care planning process. The document begins with explanatory notes concerning those formats, which were developed from detailed work involving social work, health, police services and voluntary organisations. All adult care groups (older people, physical disability, learning disability, mental health, and substance use) are represented in the project work, which also drew on child protection and criminal justice experience.