More women than men in Scottish government, research finds

Statistics published by Scotland's chief statistician show that there are slightly more women in Scotland's government workforce.

This is part of the latest quarterly Scottish Government Workforce Diversity and Inclusion Information statistics.

It covers the diversity of Scottish Government permanent staff in core directorates, some agencies and some non-ministerial departments and the experiences of different demographic groups.

They found that female staff make up just over 57 per cent of the Scottish Government workforce, compared to a little over 50 per cent of Scotland’s population aged 16 to 64.
    
The Scottish Government workforce aged between 16 and 29 years old make up 15.8 per cent of the workforce, compared to more than a quarter (26.6 per cent) of Scotland’s population.

Disabled staff make up a little over 15 per cent of the Scottish Government workforce.

Ethnic minority staff make up less than 5 per cent of the Scottish Government workforce, compared to 5.8 per cent of the country's population.

Lesbian, gay, bisexual (or any other sexual orientation not including straight/heterosexual) staff make up almost 9 per cent of the Scottish Government workforce which is slightly higher than the rest of the country (3.5 per cent).

While these figures are encouraging, the People Survey conducted in 2022 (the annual UK Civil Service employee engagement survey) found that some groups do not feel as comfortable as they should.

For example, transgender staff are less likely to feel included and treated fairly (75 per cent) than cisgender staff (86.9 per cent).

Also, staff whose parents never worked are less likely to feel included treated fairly (81.5 per cent) than staff from a high socio-economic background (87.2 per cent).

According to the People Survey 2022 , the Scottish Government workforce results on Inclusion and Fair Treatment varied by demographic and diversity group:

The full data has not been published yet, but will be released when the wider Civil Service workforce data is made available.