Aberdeen City and Aberdeenshire Bairns’ Hoose Pathfinders

In October 2023, the Scottish Government announced funding for six key pathfinder partnerships in Fife, North Strathclyde, Aberdeenshire, Aberdeen City, Tayside and the Outer Hebrides. These pathfinders are intended to act as early test sites for the application of the Scottish Barnahus Standards across different regions and operational contexts. In January 2024 the University of Edinburgh agreed to partner with Aberdeenshire Council and Aberdeen City Council’s Bairns’ Hoose Pathfinder projects on their implementation journeys. Learning from these pathfinders will inform the next, full pilot stage of the project across Scotland. 

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The aim of the evaluation was to learn about: How do planned changes resulting from Aberdeenshire Bairns' Hoose Pathfinder Partnership work to improve supports for child victims’ safety, justice, recovery and recognition in the aftermath of abuse?
Between 25 November 2024 and 6 January 2025, a research survey was conducted to examine professionals’ perspectives on current systems and services responding to reports or disclosures of abuse in Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire local authority areas. 243 professionals across social work, education and early years, police, health, justice and the voluntary sector shared their views. This survey is the first of its kind in Scotland to gather information from multidisciplinary professionals involved in child protection, justice, health and recovery systems supporting children after identification of harm prior to the implementation of the Bairns’ Hoose model. The survey highlights pressure points in the system particularly around follow-up resources, and helps identify where partnerships should focus time and resources to make the system improvements required for Bairns’ Hoose to be successful. Click here to read the final report: Preparing for Bairns' Hoose in Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire: Professionals Survey on Current Systems and Readiness for Change. 
In November 2025 the University of Edinburgh published Key learning for change: Aberdeenshire Bairns’ Hoose programme theory and Key learning for change: Aberdeen City Bairns’ Hoose programme theory. These reports offer a collective vision and summary of significant progress in relation to implementation of the Bairns’ Hoose model in Aberdeenshire and Aberdeen City. The learning gathered offers valuable insights into what is needed to translate this vision into practice and reinforces the importance of continued collaboration, reflection and adaption as the approach evolves. The complexity and scale of the transformational systems change being implemented at this level takes time, and we would like to stress that the content of these reports should not be read simply as a ‘to do’ list for the Pathfinders. Instead, we would suggest they are used as reflective tools to collectively help guide the Bairns Hoose Partnership’s future decision-making.