An overview of the Health and Social Care (Wales) Act 2025, it's passage through the Senedd and subordinate legislation.
Contents
Overview
The Health and Social Care (Wales) Act 2025 (“the 2025 Act”) makes provision about the regulation and provision of social care services and health care in Wales.
Part 1 of the 2025 Act relates to social care, it:
- makes amendments to the Social Services and Well-being (Wales) Act 2014 (“the 2014 Act”) and the Regulation and Inspection of Social Care (Wales) Act 2016 (“the 2016 Act”) intended to restrict the extraction of profit by providers of children’s care home services, secure accommodation services and fostering services
- makes a number of miscellaneous amendments in relation to social care services, social care workers and local authority social services, intended to ensure that the 2014 and 2016 Acts can operate fully and effectively.
Part 2 of the 2025 Act relates to health care and makes amendments to the National Health Service (Wales) Act 2006 in order to enable the introduction of direct payments within NHS Continuing Healthcare.
Part 3 of the 2025 Act contains a number of general provisions, including in relation to regulations made under the Act, interpretation, powers to make consequential and transitional provisions, and coming into force arrangements.
The explanatory notes to the 2025 Act provide detailed commentary on the various provisions.
Read the full act:
Coming into force
Section 29 makes provision for the coming into force of the 2025 Act:
The following provisions came into force on 25 March 2025 (the day after the 2025 Act received Royal Assent):
- in Part 1, sections 1, 16, 21 and 22 (in so far as it relates to paragraph 3(b) of Schedule 1), and paragraphs 2(1) and (6), 3(b), 5(1) and (4), and 7(1), (3), (4), (14) and (15) of Schedule 1
- in Part 2, sections 23 and 26
- all of Part 3
All other provisions in the 2025 Act will come into force on a day appointed by the Welsh Ministers, in an order made by statutory instrument or Welsh statutory instrument. The following Order has been made:
Subordinate legislation made under the Act
| Title | Citation number | Made date | Coming into force date | Supporting documents |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Annual Returns (Miscellaneous Amendments) (Wales) Regulations 2026 on legislation.gov.uk | 2026 No. 74 | 4 March 2026 | 1 April 2026 | 2026 No. 74: explanatory Memorandum on senedd.wales |
| The Health and Social Care (Wales) Act 2025 (Consequential Amendments) (Wales) Regulations 2026 on legislation.gov.uk | 2026 No. 98 | 25 March 2026 | 1 April 2026 | 2026 No. 98: explanatory Memorandum on senedd.wales |
Consideration of the legislation by the Senedd
The Bill was introduced to the Senedd on 20 May 2024 by Dawn Bowden MS, who was the Minister for Social Care at the time. It was passed by the Senedd on 4 February 2025 and received Royal Assent on 24 March 2025:
More information about the Act and the Bill's passage through the Senedd on senedd.wales.
An explanatory memorandum was originally prepared for consideration by the Senedd alongside the Bill. This has now been revised and updated to reflect the final form of the 2025 Act: