According to the enacted text published on legislation.gov.uk, the Non-surgical Procedures and Functions of Medical Reviewers (Scotland) Act 2026 was passed by the Scottish Parliament on 17 March 2026 and received Royal Assent on 12 May 2026. The Act has two main strands. One creates a new statutory regime for higher-risk non-surgical procedures in Scotland. The other amends the law on death certification and authorisation of cremation or hydrolysis. For providers, the immediate point is timing. The Act does not switch every rule on at once. Some administrative provisions came into force the day after Royal Assent, but most of the operational rules will start on dates set later by Scottish Ministers through commencement regulations. The restriction on providing procedures outside permitted premises cannot be brought into force before 6 September 2027.
The legislation defines a non-surgical procedure by both method and list. It covers procedures that pierce or penetrate the skin, including by needle, chemical, medicine, heat, cold, light, laser, sound or electricity, where the procedure falls within schedule 1. In plain English, that schedule catches ablative laser skin resurfacing, deeper chemical peels, needle core skin sampling, injectable cosmetic or wellbeing treatments, intravenous drips for cosmetic or wellbeing purposes, certain intimate-area procedures other than standard non-ablative laser hair removal, stronger microneedling, subcision and thread lifts. The drafting is equally important for what it leaves out. The Act does not cover treatment provided on behalf of the health service, procedures delivered by healthcare providers to prevent, diagnose or treat illness, clinical trials, or activities already brought into a separate licensing system under the Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982. The schedule also makes clear that wellbeing is defined broadly enough to include services marketed as improving energy, alertness, stamina or concentration, not only appearance.
Section 2 creates a direct criminal rule: it is an offence to provide a covered non-surgical procedure to a person under 18. The statutory defence is that the provider took reasonable steps to establish age and reasonably believed the client was 18 or over. The Act allows Scottish Ministers to specify by regulations what counts as reasonable age-checking, and once the issue is raised in court the prosecution must disprove the defence beyond reasonable doubt. That structure matters for clinics, pharmacies and individual practitioners because it pushes age assurance into routine compliance rather than informal judgement. Providers offering injectables or other in-scope treatments will need records, identity-check processes and staff training that can be evidenced later. A verbal assurance from a client is unlikely to be treated as a safe operating model once ministerial guidance and regulations are in place.
Section 3 creates a second offence: providing a covered procedure outside permitted premises. The permitted premises listed in the Act are tightly drawn. They include registered independent clinics and hospitals, certain dental and primary medical premises, and registered pharmacies. Homes and care homes are excluded, and a vehicle only counts in limited cases, such as a vehicle linked to a registered independent clinic and not used as the client's dwelling. In practice, the Act is aimed at reducing treatment in improvised or poorly supervised settings. Mobile models are not banned outright, but they are restricted to specific regulated circumstances. For operators who currently rely on home visits, beauty-room sublets or ad hoc rented spaces, section 3 points to a significant change in business model once it is commenced.
Much of the longer-term shape of the system is left to secondary legislation. Section 5 allows Scottish Ministers to impose further restrictions and requirements, to set different rules for different categories of procedure, to specify who may provide or supervise treatment, and to require training or qualifications. The same power can be used to require pre-procedure medical history assessments and enhanced informed consent where risk factors are identified, including factors linked to anatomy, medical history or mental health. Those regulations may also amend existing enactments and create related offences. The Act also sets a timetable. Within three years of section 3 coming into force, Ministers must lay draft regulations covering who may provide or supervise non-surgical procedures and what training or qualifications they must hold, unless they report to the Scottish Parliament that doing so is not practicable. Separate powers in section 14 allow Ministers to create approval processes for people seeking permission to provide or supervise non-surgical procedures or certain licensed procedures, with a regulator designated to decide applications, reviews and appeals. Those regulations may also create an offence of making a false or misleading statement in an application, punishable on summary conviction by a fine up to level 5 on the standard scale.
Enforcement is assigned to Healthcare Improvement Scotland, identified in the Act as HIS. Authorised persons appointed by HIS may enter and search premises where they have reasonable grounds to suspect offences under the under-18 ban or the premises restriction. Entry can be by consent, by warrant, or without a warrant if delay would frustrate the purpose and the premises are not used as a dwelling. Items may be seized where they may provide evidence. Those powers are not unlimited. The Act excludes premises used for the purpose of providing an independent health care service, entry must normally be at a reasonable time unless delay would frustrate the purpose, and unoccupied premises must be left properly secured on departure. Even so, the enforcement model is firmer than a guidance-based scheme. Occupiers must comply with reasonable directions and provide information or assistance, and intentional obstruction is itself a criminal offence.
The penalty framework is consistent across the main offences. A person convicted under section 2, section 3 or the obstruction offence in section 11 may be fined up to £20,000 on summary conviction, or face an unlimited fine on indictment. Where an offence is committed by a relevant organisation, liability can also extend to a responsible individual if the offence involved consent or connivance, or was attributable to neglect. Schedule 2 then threads the new rules into the National Health Service (Scotland) Act 1978. According to the enacted text on legislation.gov.uk, Healthcare Improvement Scotland's remit is widened so that it can oversee this field, cancel registration where new regulatory requirements are breached, and use its inquiry and default powers in relation to Part 1 of the 2026 Act. For established providers, that means the statute is not a stand-alone ban. It is built into existing health regulation machinery.
The Act does not leave interpretation entirely to enforcement bodies or the courts. Scottish Ministers must issue and publish guidance on the provision of non-surgical procedures, including compliance steps on HIS registration, staffing and age checks. They must also review the operation of Part 1 within five years of section 3 coming into force, including an assessment of the effect on businesses and how enforcement is working, and lay the report before the Scottish Parliament. That review must consult HIS, the chief constable of the Police Service of Scotland and other persons Ministers consider appropriate. The list of covered procedures is not fixed permanently. Ministers can amend schedule 1 by regulations, and they can also change the list of regulated healthcare professionals used in the Act. Key regulation-making powers, including changes to schedule 1, permitted premises and the first approval-scheme regulations, use affirmative procedure, and Ministers must consult before laying those instruments. The system is therefore designed to be adjusted as practice changes, rather than remaining tied to the market as it stood in May 2026.
The second half of the Act makes narrower but still material changes to the Certification of Death (Scotland) Act 2011. Medical reviewers may now reject an application by an interested person to review a medical certificate of cause of death if the application is vexatious, duplicates a case already under review, or it is otherwise appropriate to reject it. Where an application is rejected, the reviewer must tell the applicant why. The Act also removes wording in section 8 of the 2011 Act that previously referred to rejecting reviews 'as vexatious'. A separate set of amendments widens certain powers from Scotland to the whole of the United Kingdom. The power to require documents, and the power of medical reviewers to authorise cremation or hydrolysis, are no longer limited to Scotland. In practical terms, the legislation tightens control of cosmetic and wellbeing procedures while also updating the death review system for cross-border evidence and authorisations.
For clinics, pharmacies and practitioners, the central message is that Scotland is moving this market away from loosely supervised provision and towards a model based on designated premises, formal oversight and ministerial rule-making. For the public, the Act is likely to be most visible in three places: age checks for cosmetic injectables and related procedures, fewer treatments delivered in homes or ad hoc venues, and clearer state oversight of who can provide higher-risk services. The next operational question is commencement. Until Scottish Ministers make the necessary regulations, much of the working detail will remain pending. But the enacted text already points to a clear policy choice: higher-risk non-surgical procedures are being treated less as ordinary consumer services and more as a matter of public protection.