Public Sector Employment In Scotland Statistics For 4th Quarter 2021

Statistics based on administrative records and surveys of individual public sector bodies carried out by the Scottish Government and the Office for National Statistics (ONS). This is a snapshot of employment as at December 2021.


Table 5: Total devolved public sector employment by sector; Scotland, Full-time Equivalent

Not Seasonally Adjusted

Quarter Total Devolved
Public Sector
NHS Civil Service Police and Fire Services [note 2] Further Education Colleges [note 3] Other Public Bodies Local Government [note 2] Public Corporations
Q4 1999 387,100 106,900 14,000 - 11,500 7,800 238,000 9,000
Q4 2015 425,700 138,300 15,900 27,400 10,600 13,700 200,000 20,000
Q4 2016 424,600 139,300 15,900 27,200 10,300 13,700 198,000 21,000
Q4 2017 427,000 140,300 16,300 26,900 10,400 13,800 199,000 21,000
Q4 2018 419,900 140,700 17,200 27,200 10,400 14,200 202,000 8,000
Q4 2019 427,100 142,500 19,500 27,400 10,500 14,200 205,000 8,000
Q4 2020 441,900 148,600 20,400 27,500 10,200 14,100 208,000 13,000
Q4 2021 456,400 155,800 23,200 27,400 10,300 13,900 213,000 13,000
Change on year to:
Q4 2021 14,550 7,200 2,740 -100 60 -150 4,930 -130
% change on year:
Q4 2021 3.3% 4.8% 13.4% -0.4% 0.6% -1.1% 2.4% -1.0%

Notes:

1. Employment figures have been rounded to the nearest hundred, with the exception of local government and public corporation figures which are rounded to the nearest thousand; change on year rounded to the nearest ten; percentages are based on unrounded figures. "-" denotes blank entries. Totals may not equal the sum of individual parts due to rounding.

2. Police and Fire Reform: From Q2 2013 Police and Fire Services have been reclassified as central government rather than local government (as their predecessors were). All police staff are employed by the Scottish Police Authority (SPA) whether deployed with the SPA or with the Police Service of Scotland.

3. Information for further education colleges in Scotland is based on collected information from Q4 2010. The method used to create the back series is detailed in the background notes of this publication.

4. For further information on interpreting these series, see the series reclassification guide or background notes of the publication.

Contact

Email: LMStats@gov.scot

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