Scottish Government Fishery Officer roles: FOI release

Information requested

In a recent response to an FOI request, the Scottish Government provided information demonstrating that, in March 2021, the Scottish Government employed 48 fishery officers. By March 2024 this had dropped to just 11.

Please provide a breakdown of what happened to the 48 digitisers employed by the Scottish Government as of 31 March 2021 from that date to present. This should include:

1. (Question 1) Number of these individuals who are still Scottish Government employees. For these people, please state the total annual expense to the Scottish Government of their employment as of 31 March 2021, and total annual expense to the Scottish Government of their employment as of present date. Please also provide a breakdown of their job titles as of present date.

2. (Question 2) Number of these individuals who were offered voluntary redundancy and a) declined and b) accepted.

3. (Question 3) Total expense on voluntary redundancy payments for all these people who accepted voluntary redundancy between 31 March 2021 and present.

4. (Question 4) A breakdown of those who are no longer employed by the Scottish Government by what happened to them (e.g. Retirement 5, Resignation 7, Fired 1 etc.)

Please note that I have interpreted your reference to 'digitisers' as erroneous and that this should read as 'fishery officers'.

Response

The Fishery Officers were retitled to Operations officers due to the changing workstreams for Compliance across the Marine Directorate, not just relating to Fisheries, such as Marine Licensing.

Question 1

Of the 48 fishery officers who were in post as at March 2021, 43 remain Scottish Government employees at at September 2024, which is the most recent data available. Their job titles are as follows:

Job Title	N
Enforcement and Assurance Support Officer	1
FDF Co-ordinator	1
Fishery Officer	8
Highly Protected Marine Areas Policy Officer	1
Interim Portfolio Manager	1
Marine Fish and Fisheries Scientist	1
Marine Invasive Non-Native Species Policy Manager	1
Marine Licensing Casework Officer	1
Marine Licensing and Consenting Casework Officer	1
Marine Restoration Policy Officer and Marine Biodiversity Officer	2
Operations Officer	22
Senior Operations Officer	3

The total annual expense of the employment of this group of staff, as at 31 March 2021, was £1,481,560.66. Based on data as at September 2024, the annualised total expense for the 2024/2025 financial year is £1,724,592.54. We have interpreted annual expense as the total cost of pension contributions, employer NI contributions, and wage costs.

Question 2

No individuals in your request were offered voluntary redundancy.

Question 3

As no individuals were offered voluntary redundancy, the answer to your question is nil.

Question 4

Of the five individuals who have left Scottish Government, their reasons for leaving were as follows:

Retirement	4
Resignation	1

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.