Holyrood’s health, social care and sport committee is to consult the public again on the National Care Service (NCS) Bill, in response to a large number of planned amendments to the original legislation being put forward by the Scottish government.

The general principles of the Bill were passed by a majority of MSPs last month, after the social care minister promised to make substantial changes.

In an unusual move, the lead scrutiny committee now plans to give the public another chance to share their views on the drastically changed proposals.

A majority of the health committee agreed to back the proposals, on the condition that it would have the chance to undertake ‘substantial further scrutiny’ of the Bill.

At a private meeting last week, health committee members agreed to issue a draft call for views to support them to do this before formal stage 2 proceedings – the line by line scrutiny of the bill – go ahead.

Social care minister Maree Todd MSP told the committee in a letter sent last week that a new version of the Bill will be sent to the committee ‘no later than June 2024’.

A public call for views is expected to go live soon after.

Ms Todd also confirmed that the government has established an Expert Legislative Advisory Group to help make changes to the Bill.

The Group, made up of representatives across the sector, will work with the government over the next eight to ten weeks to ‘supplement and augment’ engagement and ‘bring focus’ to amendments, she said.

Co-design of the NCS with people with lived experience of accessing or working in social care services will also continue throughout the next year at least.

The government’s co-design plan for the 2024/25 financial year, shared with the committee, shows that ministers intends to ask for input on the functions and scope of the NCS, how ethical commissioning should work, on the National Social Work Agency and the integrated health and social care record.

According to the letter, the government has directly engaged more than 1,000 people with lived experience and 112 stakeholder organisations since February 2022.