Around one in every 10 asylum seeking adults arriving in Aberdeen are revealing themselves to be children.
Between June and the end of November as many as 40 people later claimed to be under the age of 18, having arrived in the Granite City.
Leaders say the predicament is straining the support systems in place for them.
And council bosses have identified child migration as a “serious risk” to ongoing work with vulnerable people already in Aberdeen.
There are fears resources will be stretched too thinly to meet the care, protection and wellbeing demands of those refugees in the city’s care.
Labour councillor Kate Blake said the risk was “incredibly alarming”.
What does Aberdeen provide for asylum-seeking children?
Aberdeen City Council is already providing for unaccompanied asylum seeking children and young people, and all families being resettled.
But this unforeseen extra demand is risking the level of help offered to groups, refugees and children affected by crime and sexual exploitation.
Aberdeen’s children’s social work chief Graeme Simpson recently claimed that the extra, unexpected, unaccompanied child asylum seekers were “almost doubling” the number of unaccompanied youngsters the council has to support.
“We are seeing quite a significant shift in presentation of unaccompanied asylum-seeking children in the city,” he told councillors.
How does this happen?
This mix-up can occur when people fleeing war-torn nations arrive in the UK.
According to Refugee Council, between January and December 2021, 233 young asylum seekers were incorrectly deemed to be adults by the Home Office.
Most of them were later proven to be children when the local authorities looking after them investigated.
Mr Simpson added: “There are two routes into Aberdeen. One is the national transfer scheme where children, identified as children when they arrive in Kent, are dispersed across the country on an equal basis.
“However, since June we have found about 10% of adult asylum seekers subsequently claim to be under 18, having arrived in the city.”
Are all those declaring themselves asylum-seeking children in Aberdeen actually under 18?
Between 30 and 40 additional unaccompanied children have declared themselves to authorities having arrived in Aberdeen as adults, since the summer.
Social workers are trying their best to assess their age but work to a presumption that those saying they are under 18 should be treated as such.
Mr Simpson added: “We provide care and support according to their claimed age, unless there are clear indicators that suggest they are not under 18.
“That has almost doubled the number of unaccompanied asylum seeking children in the last three or four months.
“Clearly that’s something that has placed, and continues to place, quite a demand on the workforce.”
Aberdeen school roll ‘bulging’ less this year
It comes as the number of children moving to Aberdeen with student parents has steeply fallen.
Last year education chiefs warned the steep rise in international student families was making it difficult to place all children from families at the same school.
Around 2,500 pupils were added to the roll in 2022.
But this year only an additional 300 youngsters were enrolled in city schools due to their parents studying at Aberdeen’s two universities.
“It’s a slight rise but nothing like the numbers seen previously,” child services director Eleanor Sheppard said.
New migration rules come into force in January, stopping all but research postgraduates from bringing dependents into the UK on a student visa.
Ms Sheppard added: “It will be really key to look again in January to really get a clear sense of the impact of the UK legislation.
“Then we will take account of that information in school roll forecasting.”
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