New stats reveal drop in Scots care workforce

The number of people working in Scottish social services has dropped for the third consecutive year according to new figures from the Scottish Social Services Council.

The new 2013 Workforce Data Report shows that there were around 2700 less people working in the sector when compared with the previous year.

The report presents information on the number of social service workers in Scotland and a breakdown of the number of people working in all sub-sectors (ie the different types of social services) and across employer types (public, private, voluntary) within individual local authorities.

Anna Fowlie, SSSC Chief Executive said, “The statistics show that slightly fewer people are working in the social services sector in Scotland compared to last year. Despite this, around one in 13 people in paid employment in Scotland work in social services and this workforce also remains approximately 20% larger than the NHS workforce which puts the size and therefore the impact of this workforce into context.

“Our report highlights that the social service workforce is continuing to change as the way services are delivered and accessed by people changes.  This could be for a number of reasons for example, financial constraints, the older age profile meaning that a higher proportion of staff are retiring or more people are employing their own personal assistants.

“Our workforce will look very different over the next few years as social services adapt to continuing funding pressures and an expectation from both government and the public for higher quality, bespoke services that are shaped around people’s particular needs.

“Scotland’s ambition to deliver better services is built around people and their communities. In the current climate difficult decisions have to be made and having the right information is even more important for employers of all sizes in planning for the future. We will continue to work with employers so that the information we provide is useful and meaningful.”

Key points from the report

• The size of the workforce appears to have fallen for the third year in a row, from 192,360 in 2012, a drop of 1.4%, to 189,670 in 2013.
• The private sector continues to increase its share of the labour market, employing 41% of people working in social services in Scotland. The public sector employs 32% and the voluntary sector employs 27%.
• In the majority of local authority areas the private sector accounts for the largest part of the workforce compared to the public and voluntary sector. The public sector is the biggest provider in Orkney, Shetland and the Western Isles.
• The largest types of social services are housing support/care at home, care homes for adults and day care of children; together, these account for almost 76% of the workforce. Housing support/care at home services saw the largest drop in the actual number of staff employed, from 64,290 to 61,350.
• This continues to be an older workforce across most services (the median age in the public sector is 47). Early years services employ a higher proportion of younger people.
• The percentage of men working in social services fell by 1% in the last year to  15% of the overall workforce, though it is double that in criminal justice services and children’s residential services.
• Around 79% of the workforce is employed on permanent contracts, which is the same as in 2013. Most are also full-time positions, though at least 10% of the employment appears to be on zero hours contracts or equivalent.

The report, available at http://data.sssc.uk.com/  provides an overview of the data at a national level and combines data from the SSSC’s annual census of staff in local authority social work services as well as data collected by the Care Inspectorate from all registered care providers.