FIFE Council are looking to welcome four children as part of a UK-wide asylum seeker dispersal scheme that could cost £5.8 million.

That’s the top end of what the council would pay after councillors agreed to submit an offer of assistance to CoSLA and the Home Office.

The Home Office approached all local authorities in June due to a larger number of migrant boats arriving in England across the Channel.

Fife Council said they would be interested in accommodating and supporting four children between the ages of 10 and 12 and with relatively low health and additional educational support needs.

The cost depends on where the children would be placed with the figure ranging from £865,280 for a council foster care placement, to £5.824m for a purchased residential care placement.

Councillor Judy Hamilton, convenor of the community and housing services committee, said: “I’m very proud that we are able to consider opportunity to welcome some unaccompanied children, who are displaced by war, to Fife.

“They are some of the most vulnerable people in the world and it is the right thing for Fife to play our part in supporting them.

“Children who came to Fife in recent years from Syria have settled in our communities and been welcomed and supported, along with their families.

“We have a track record of welcoming and accepting new Fifers."

She added: “These children, however, are unaccompanied by a family or support network, and I believe that we can be the support network they need, to offer them the right education, care and support to rebuild and thrive, and we welcome them also as new Fifers.

“It’s also important that we help out other local authorities that are facing particular pressures at this time.”

Financial support is available from the Home Office.

A report was presented to the policy and co-ordination committee last Thursday.

It stated that the multi-agency response to support children coming to Fife will be coordinated through the Syrian Vulnerable Persons Core Group which has helped resettle Syrian refugees across the Kingdom in recent years.

The report added: “We can confirm that given Fife would not qualify currently for the revised costs there would be additional costs for the council to meet but this has to be balanced with the urgent need to offer support at this time of crisis."