Increasing employment of disabled people in public sector: analysis of consultation responses

1. Introduction

1.1. Context

1.1.1. In December 2016, the Scottish Government published A Fairer Scotland for Disabled People^[3]. As a key part of the delivery plan a commitment was made to:

• Reduce barriers to employment for disabled people;
• Seek to reduce by at least half the employment rate gap between disabled people and the rest of the working age population.

1.1.2. A Fairer Scotland for Disabled People sets out a number of key actions that establishes the overarching ambitions of Scottish Government actions on disability issues including to consult on setting targets to redress the disability employment gap in the public sector (action no 29).

1.2. Overview of consultation analysis

1.2.1. This document provides a full, detailed analysis of the consultation responses undertaken by Cambridge Policy Consultants (CPC). The responses include all those submitted on-line and by email over the duration of the consultation which ran from 30 April to 15 August 2018. In addition, six workshops were held across Scotland where consultee discussed the potential options. All of the online responses have been included in the quantitative analysis presented in the tables in the subsequent sections. Both the online and workshop responses were used in the qualitative analysis presented throughout this report.

Number of consultation responses

1.2.2. The total number of Citizenspace responses was 110. This included eight responses which were either in draft via Citizenspace or submitted by email. These were included in the dataset for coding by Scottish Government or the consultant team. Some of the email responses were fuller than those received directly via Citizenspace and these wider issues were considered in the analysis.

1.2.3. The majority of respondents answered all points. However, a small number did not respond to all of the questions. In other cases, some respondents provided a ranking of the target options while other set out just their preferred option.

Profile of Citizenspace consultation responses

1.2.4. Table 1.1 sets out the profile of the respondents who represented the following:

• Forty-five percent of responses (49) were from the public sector of which just over half (27 were from Local Government and a further 14 were from other public bodies including a range of national (Scottish) and some national (UK) organisations, regeneration agencies, and non-ministerial public bodies;
• Well over a quarter (29 percent) of respondents were from the Third Sector, with a predominance of disability-related organisations, where this is specified;
• Just under one in five (19 percent) responses were from individuals. It is clear that some of these were individuals who work in a range of public bodies but who wanted to submit their own views. It was not clear how many of these individuals were themselves disabled;
• Other organisations were under-represented at 7 percent of responses and comprised professional membership organisations, trade unions and Higher education institutions.

Table 1.1: Type of Respondent

Source: Citizenspace and email responses to SG Consultation by 4 September 2018

1.2.5. To provide a more coherent analysis of respondents we have grouped responses. This involves combining Local Government, other public bodies, NHS responses and FE Colleges. The service provider is included in with other Third Sector organisations. There is no change to the individual group. Other organisations included Professional Membership Organisations, Trade Unions and HE organisations^[4]. In analysing each of the key consultation responses we have highlighted any observed differences in the nature of the responses across these groups should they exist.

1.2.6. The vast majority of respondents were happy to have their responses published (83 percent). However, just under half of these did not want to have their name published with over half the individual responses did not wish to be named (55 percent).

Profile of workshop responses

1.2.7. In addition, Scottish Government organised six consultation events across Scotland in June/July 2018. The purpose of the events was to provide stakeholders with the opportunity to come together to discuss the issues covered by the consultation document, ahead of submitting a formal response:

• Glasgow, attended by approximately 57 including third sector organisations, local authorities and disabled individuals;
• Dundee, attended by approximately 51 comprising of third sector organisations, NHS and Local Authorities;
• Inverness, attended by a mix of approximately 29 third sector organisations, NHS bodies and Local Authorities;
• Aberdeen, attended by approximately 26 third sector, Local Authority and NHS organisations;
• Edinburgh, attended by approximately 37 and including a mix of third sector organisations, Local Authorities and disabled individuals;
• Dumfries, attended by a mix approximately of 18 third sector organisations, local authorities and disabled individuals.

1.2.8. The write-ups from the consultation events were checked against the collected views from the consultation responses, and these were consistent in broad terms. Where views differed from the consultation responses they were detailed in the relevant section.