Public Sector Employment in Scotland Statistics for 2nd Quarter 2012

2. Public sector employment by devolved and reserved responsibility; Headcount (Table 3)

This section provides a summary of public sector employment in:

• Devolved public bodies which are the responsibility of the Scottish Government or Scottish Parliament;
• Reserved public bodies for which the UK Government has ministerial responsibility.

Of total public sector employment in Scotland, 487,600 (84%) covers people employed in devolved public bodies. This is a decrease of 11,400 (2.3%), down from 499,000 to 487,600, since Q2 2011. The fall in the last year is driven by a decrease in local government employment, down 7,000 (2.4%), NHS employment has decreased by 1,900 (1.2%) and further education colleges down 1,300 (8.2%)

There were 92,600 (16%) people employed in the reserved public sector in Scotland. This was a decrease of 5,300 (5.4%), down from 97,900 to 92,600, in the last year. Employment in the reserved public sector financial institutions decreased by 1,800 (5.4%) in the last year and the reserved civil service decreased by 1,700 (5.5%).

Overall public sector employment decreased by 16,700 (2.8%), down from 596,900 to 580,100 in the last year. Chart 3 below shows how this is split between devolved and reserved public sector.

Chart 3: Annual change (from Q2 2011 to Q2 2012) in public sector employment by devolved and reserved responsibility, Headcount