Scottish Government employee accident at work statistics: FOI release

Information requested

• For each year of 2017, 2018 and 2019, the number of accidents at work formally recorded amongst all Scottish government employees, including the headcount of employees for each year
• For the same years, the headcount of employees who were required to work in government offices and the number of accidents at work in each year formally recorded for that cohort
• For the same years, the headcount of employees in each year who worked from home and the number of accidents at work in each year formally recorded for that cohort
• For the years 2020 and 2021, the headcount of all employee and the number of accidents at work in each year formally recorded
• For the years 2020 and 2021, the headcount of employees who were required to work in government offices and the number of accidents at work in each year formally recorded for that cohort
• For the years 2020 and 2021, the headcount of employees in each year who worked from home and the number of accidents at work in each year formally recorded for that cohort
• For the years 2022, 2023 and 2024, the number of accidents at work in each year formally recorded for all Scottish government employees, including the headcount of employees for each year
• For the years 2022, 2023 and 2024, the headcount of employees who were required to work in government offices and the number of accidents at work in each year formally recorded  for that cohort
• For the years 2022, 2023 and 2024, the headcount of employees in each year who worked from home and the number of accidents at work in each year formally recorded for that cohort
• A copy of the policies covering accidents at work, including how government has differentiated between accidents at government office locations and accidents occurring at home while working from home
• For each year, the total cumulative payments made out to employees as a result of accidents at work, including a breakdown covering those accidents happening at government office locations and those happening at home

Response

I enclose a copy of most of the information you requested.

The answer to your question is below:

For points 1, 4 and 7, please find the information in the table below:

Year	Headcount*	Total Accidents	Of those, accidents at home	Of those, accidents in the office
2017	5535	125	Nil	125
2018	6170	112	1	111
2019	6827	100	Nil	100
2020	7271	48	2	46
2021	8291	35	Nil	35
2022	8848	47	Nil	47
2023	8824	39	2	37
2024	8975	51	1	50

* Taken from Scottish Government workforce information - gov.scot. Using the total FTE data for Q4 of each year.

For points 2, 3, 5, 6, 8 and 9, you ask the headcount of employees in each year who worked from home and in government offices. The Scottish Government (SG) has implemented a hybrid working policy which applies to the majority of our employees. Hybrid working arrangements ensure that colleagues combine working from home with a presence in a workplace (and for some roles, with stakeholders and in communities) each week and may vary from week to week depending on business need.

As agreements on hybrid working are reached locally between the employee and their manager they are not recorded centrally and we therefore do not have ways to monitor or track how many of our employees are working remotely versus working in Scottish Government facilities.

Therefore, whilst our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance the Scottish Government does not hold the data that you have requested on the numbers who worked from  home and in government offices. This is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have the information you have requested.

For item 10 you ask for A copy of the policies covering accidents at work, including how government has differentiated between accidents at government office locations and accidents occurring at home while working from home. Please find the response below:

The specific guidance on Accident Reporting is provided in Appendix A. Guidance for staff is updated more frequently on staff intranet pages, see Appendix B, this was regularly reviewed throughout the Covid-19 pandemic and is reviewed on a regular basis now.

For item 11, you ask for each year, the total cumulative payments made out to employees as a result of accidents at work, including a breakdown covering those accidents happening at government office locations and those happening at home. Please information see below:

Period	Total cumulative payments	Of those, accidents at home	Of those, accidents in the office
2017-24	£230,442.00	Nil	£230,442.00

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.

FOI 202500462252 - Information Released - Annex A and B

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