What resources it has made available to the voluntary sector to help it comply with the statutory requirement to register care workers.

Social service workers whowill be required to register are expected to meet the criteria set by the Scottish Social Services Council. Part of the criteria for registration willinclude obtaining or working towards certain qualifications. The payment offees for registration is the responsibility of the individual. However, trainingof the social care workforce within the voluntary sector is the responsibilityof individual employers.
To help the sector progress towardsany qualifications criteria set for registration, the Executive providetraining grants under section 9 of the Social Work (Scotland) Act 1968 topromote an acceptable level of practice competence in key areas of social workcovered by the voluntary sector. This enables voluntary organisations involvedto provide or secure training for their paid staff and voluntary workers whichwould not otherwise be available to them.
In October 2003, the Executive announced an additional £9 million over the next three years forlocal authorities to invest in training. Ministers have made it clear thatstaff who work in partnership with local authorities, including independentproviders from the voluntary and private sector will benefit from thisadditional funding.
Currently, the ScottishSocial Services Council is undertaking an investigation of all the key fundingstreams available for training in the social work sector and this will includethe voluntary sector.