Scottish Government staff suspended with pay statistics: FOI release

Information requested

In your request you asked for the following information:

1. In each year since 2020-21, including the current year to date, how many employees at this public body have been suspended with full pay? Where an employee’s suspension covers multiple financial years, please only include the year where they were initially suspended.

2. In relation to Q1, what is the respective salary of these employees?

3. Please provide as much detail as possible on why these employees were suspended. E.g. Disciplinary issues, poor quality of work etc.

Response

Our response covers permanent staff employed in Scottish Government Core Director-General business areas, as outlined in Annex A. Requests for information about other agencies/bodies should be sent directly to them.

You have requested information on the number of employees who have been suspended on full pay in each financial year since 2020–21, their salaries, and the reasons for suspension. The data used in this reply is therefore based on cases where the suspension start date was between 1 April 2020 and 13 November 2025 (the date of your request). Suspension is only used in exceptional circumstances and in line with our disciplinary policy (please refer to FOI 202500446732 for a copy of this policy) and ACAS guidance. The need to suspend a member of staff is kept under regular review.

Please find below the information you requested regarding employees suspended on full pay since 2020–21 and their respective pay range. Where a suspension spans multiple financial years, the employee is counted in the year the suspension began: 

Financial Year	Number of Employees Suspended	Pay Range at start date of suspension
2020-21	2	£20,064 to £22,232
		£30,652 to £35,110
2021-22	3	£24,395 to £25,934
		£31,542 to £36,129
2022-23	1	£25,713 to £27,335
2023-24	1	£30,558 to £33,539
2024-25	3	£36,585 to £41,834
		£85,400 to £86,556
2025-26	4	£26,245 to £29,257
		£38,422 to £43,934
		£47,730 to £57,151
		£77,460 to £89,403

While our aim is to provide information wherever possible, we are unable to provide the respective salaries of these employees and the reasons for suspension. This information is exempt under section 38(1)(b) of FOISA (personal information) because disclosure would contravene the data protection principles set out in Article 5(1) of the UK GDPR and section 34(1) of the Data Protection Act 2018. This exemption is absolute and not subject to the public interest test, so we are not required to consider if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption.

However, we have provided the relevant pay ranges for each suspension. The salary ranges during the  periods of suspension were subject to change in line with Scottish Government pay agreements.

ANNEX A

Core Directorates of the Scottish Government:

Director-General Communities
Director-General Corporate
Director-General Economy
Director-General Education and Justice
Director-General Health and Social Care
Director-General Net Zero
Director-General Exchequer, Strategy and Performance

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.