Main Points

This report presents statistics for Scotland’s Devolved Employment Services including No One Left Behind and Fair Start Scotland. Statistics are presented to the most recent quarter of January to March 2024.

• There have been 132,443 starts on either No One Left Behind or Fair Start Scotland (FSS) since April 2018 up to March 2024. In the most recent quarter, January to March 2024, there were 9,849 starts. This was an 25% increase on the previous quarter and a 11% increase on the same quarter in the previous year.

• There can be a delay between participant’s starting to receive No One Left Behind support and this being reported to the Scottish Government while the process of verifying eligibility takes place. This means participants who started in earlier quarters may not be reported until subsequent quarters. Therefore, data for the most recent quarters should be considered provisional.  

• Official statistics in development for No One Left Behind show a total of 61,930 people started receiving support from April 2019 to March 2024. The number of people starting to receive support has increased each year from 2,694 in year 1 (2019/20) to 20,988 in year 5 (2023/24).

• In the most recent quarter, quarter 4 of year 5, 5,778 people started to receive support through No One Left Behind. This was a 12% increase on the previous quarter and a 9% increase on the same quarter in the previous year.

• Of the 61,930 people receiving support on No One Left Behind, 19,146 (31%) have entered employment, while a further 8,783 (14%) entered further or higher education or training.

• There have been 70,513 starts to FSS since April 2018, including 6,999 re-joins which has been possible since April 2021. There were 4,071 starts in the most recent quarter, 52% higher than the previous quarter and 14% higher than the same quarter in 2023.

• For FSS, there were 1,517 job starts this quarter, 30% higher than the previous quarter and 32% higher than the same quarter in 2023. Overall, there has been 25,414 job starts since FSS launched.