Anne's Law Strengthens Care Home Visiting Rights

Scotland Care Inspectorate News

Published March 31st, 2026

Detected March 29th, 2026

Summary

The Care Inspectorate has announced that Anne's Law, strengthening care home visiting rights, will come into effect on March 31, 2026. The law introduces new duties for care home providers regarding visiting arrangements, identification of Essential Care Supporters, and transparency on restrictions. A three-month implementation period will follow the effective date.

View original document View source feed page

What changed

Effective March 31, 2026, Anne's Law will introduce new legal duties for care home providers in Scotland, strengthening the rights of residents to maintain contact with important individuals. These duties include specific requirements for visiting arrangements, the identification of Essential Care Supporters, and mandatory notification procedures when visiting is restricted. The regulations aim to ensure consistent and fair application of visiting policies, with a Code of Practice developed to guide providers and inform residents and their families.

Care home providers must ensure their policies, processes, and staff awareness align with the legislation and Code of Practice by the effective date. While a three-month implementation period (March 31 - June 30, 2026) is provided for embedding new arrangements, the notification requirements for restricted visits to residents, the Care Inspectorate, and the Chief Social Work Officer are effective immediately from March 31, 2026. Compliance with these new duties is expected, with the Care Inspectorate adopting a supportive approach during the initial implementation phase.

What to do next

Update care home policies and processes to align with Anne's Law requirements by March 31, 2026.
Ensure staff awareness and training on new visiting rights, Essential Care Supporter identification, and notification procedures.
Implement notification procedures for restricted visits to residents, Care Inspectorate, and Chief Social Work Officer from March 31, 2026.

Source document (simplified)

The regulations about care home visiting that are commonly known as Anne’s Law, will come into force on Tuesday 31 March 2026. The regulations strengthen the rights of people living in adult and older people’s care homes to maintain contact with those who are important to them. They do this by introducing duties for care home providers in relation to visiting arrangements, identification of Essential Care Supporters, and transparency where visiting is restricted for any reason.

Code of Practice

A Code of Practice has been developed to provide guidance for care home providers, managers and staff on applying the legislation consistently and fairly. It will also support care home residents, families and friends to know what they should expect from care homes.

Notification of visiting restrictions

From 31 March 2026, when care homes restrict visits for any reason, they must notify:

residents, if appropriate their representatives, and Essential Care Supporters
the Care Inspectorate
the Chief Social Work Officer for the relevant local authority. Further information about notifications to the Care Inspectorate can be found here.

Implementation period

A three-month implementation period (31 March – 30 June 2026) will apply to support providers to fully embed the new arrangements. The legal duties under Anne’s Law will apply from 31 March 2026. The Care Inspectorate will continue to take a proportionate and supportive approach, recognising that providers are implementing new requirements during this period. During this time, providers should take steps to ensure their policies, processes and staff awareness align with the legislation and Code of Practice. However, the new notification requirements will apply from 31 March 2026.

Further information and guidance will be shared shortly.