Child Disability Payment decision making guide
Reason for the check
A child is someone who is under 16 years old. Children cannot receive CDP directly. Social Security Scotland will pay assistance to an adult on the child’s behalf. This adult must have authority to act on behalf of the child. Most parents have this authority. This is because the law already gives them a set of rights and legal duties (The Children (Scotland) Act 1995, s1 and s2). These are called parental rights and responsibilities. One of these parental rights is the right to act on the child’s behalf in connection with the child’s right to social security assistance. Parental rights and responsibilities apply until the child is 16 years of age. The only exception to this is the responsibility to provide guidance to the child which exists until the child reaches 18 years of age.
If an applicant does not have parental rights and responsibilities for a child, then they cannot act on behalf of a child unless we appoint them to act. We can only appoint a person on behalf of a child if there is no person who meets each of the following criteria:
- has parental rights and responsibilities for the child,
- lives with, and looks after the child,
- is practically ‘able and willing’ to act on behalf of the child.
If the answer to any of these questions is no, then a person may not be ‘able and willing’ to manage the child’s entitlement to assistance:
- Are they capable of arranging for the assistance to be spent in the child’s interests?
- Are they capable of appealing decisions if this is required?
- If Social Security Scotland made an error when determining the child’s entitlement to assistance, would the person notice?
- If the child’s circumstances changed, would they notice and tell Social Security Scotland?
- Are they willing to manage the child’s entitlement to assistance?