Scottish Household Survey 2022: Key Findings

11. Trust in institutions

Respondents were asked to what extent they trusted seven different public institutions, namely: the Scottish Government, Local Government, the Civil Service, the Education System, the Health System, Police and the Justice System.

The institutions that respondents were most likely to express trust in were the Health System (79%) and the Police (78%). Respondents were most likely to express distrust in the Scottish Government (38%) and Local Government (32%). Respondents were least likely to express distrust in the Education system (15%) and the Police (14%) (Tables 11.34, 11.42, 11.2, 11.10, and 11.26).

Care must be taken when making comparisons between institutions, because the percentage of respondents who said they didn’t know or were not sure whether they trust an institution varied considerably. For example, 21% of respondents said they didn’t know whether they trusted the Civil Service, compared with only 3% of adults for the Health System (Table 11.1).

Trust and sex

For most institutions, men and women expressed similar overall levels of trust. However, men were more likely than women to express trust in the Health System (81% of men compared with 77% of women) (Table 11.36).

Trust and age

Trust in institutions varied by age. Adults aged 16 to 34 were more likely than adults aged 60 or over to express trust in the Scottish Government (61% compared with 46%) (Table 11.3); the Education System (71% compared with 60%) (Table 11.27); in Local Government (62% compared with 57%) (Table 11.11); and in the Health System (81% compared with 78%) (Table 11.35).

Adults aged 60 and over were more likely than adults aged 16 to 34 to trust the Justice System (66% compared with 61%) (Table 11.51) and the Police (80% compared with 75%) (Table 11.43).

Trust and disability

Disabled people were less likely than non-disabled people to express trust in public institutions. This difference was observed for all of the institutions in the survey (Tables 11.6, 11.14, 11.22, 11.30, 11.38, 11.46, 11.54).

Trust and ethnicity

‘White: Scottish’ and minority ethnic groups expressed similar levels of trust towards the Civil Service, the Education System, the Health System, the Police and the Justice system (11.21, 11.29, 11.37, 11.45, 11.53). The three most trusted institutions for both ‘White: Scottish’ and minority ethnic groups were the Education System, Health System and Police (Tables 11.29, 11.37, 11.45).

Levels of trust varied between ethnic groups for the Scottish Government and Local Government. Adults from a minority ethnic group had more trust in the Scottish Government and Local Government compared with adults from a ‘White: Scottish’ ethnic group (73% of minority ethnic group respondents trusted the Scottish Government compared with 55% of ‘White: Scottish’ ethnic group respondents; and 71% of minority ethnic group respondents trusted Local Government compared with 58% of ‘White: Scottish’ ethnic group respondents) (Tables 11.5 and 11.13).

Trust and urban rural classification

Adults in large urban areas trusted the Scottish Government more than adults in remote rural areas (60% versus 53%) (Table 11.9), while adults from remote rural areas distrusted the Scottish Government more than adults in large urban areas (40% versus 33%) (Table 11.9).

Trust and deprivation

People living in the 20% most deprived areas, as measured by the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation, were less likely to express trust in public institutions compared with people living in the 20% least deprived areas. This was true for all institutions in the survey (Tables 11.7, 11.15, 11.23, 11.31, 11.39, 11.47, 11.55).

The largest differences in trust were observed for the Justice System and the Civil Service. About 5 in 10 adults in the 20% most deprived areas trusted the Justice System (55%) while in the 20% least deprived areas about 7 in 10 adults trusted the Justice System (71%) (a difference of 16 percentage points) (Table 11.55). About 5 in 10 adults in the 20% most deprived areas trusted the Civil Service (55%). In the 20% least deprived areas, about 7 in 10 adults trusted the Civil Service (69%) (a difference of 14 percentage points) (Table 11.23).

The trust gap was smallest for the Health System where the difference in trust was nearly 4 percentage points [4](79% of adults in the 20% most deprived areas versus 82% of adults in the 20% least deprived areas) (Table 11.39).