Good Time To Be 2 applications

Special circumstances

Local Authorities may offer places to two year olds who don’t meet the Scottish Government criteria. We will consider a Good Time To Be 2 application for:

  • Two year olds on the Child Protection Register
  • Two year olds who receive medium or high DLA or PIP payments. This applies to families and children:
    • dealing with long-term disability or a health condition
    • and need support with daily living or mobility.

Discretionary criteria

Our criteria are:

  • The child has Additional Support Needs
  • The child or parent/carer has a critical or terminal illness
  • Bereavement: death of a parent or main carer 
  • Where the child’s wellbeing is discussed at Early Intervention and Prevention meetings, and a Good Time To Be 2 place is recommended
  • There has been domestic violence 
  • Where the family has had support from the Family Nursery Partnership
  • A parent or carer has a care experience background.

We may consider families in crisis for a discretionary space, in discussion with professionals from Children’s Services.

We only apply the criteria where:

  • a family does not meet the eligibility criteria set by the Scottish Government
  • and a professional supporting the family agrees that the family meets one of the above criteria and would benefit from the funding.

Apply

Supporting statement

A professional who supports the family must complete the supporting statement proforma (Word). Include this with your application.

Bring the application and supporting documents to:

Early Learning and Childcare Team
Fairfield House
8 Lothian Road
Dalkeith EH22 3AA.

The Early learning and Childcare team will decide on eligibility in consultation with other key partners.

Once the budget for discretionary places is exhausted, we will not be able to support any more discretionary places.