Current status: Answered by Tom Arthur on 22 November 2024
To ask the Scottish Government what steps it has taken to improve the (a) collection and (b) availability of information on (i) underemployment and (ii) its causes.
Data on underemployment and its causes is collected for Scotland by the Office for National Statistics’ (ONS) Labour Force Survey (LFS) and Annual Population Survey (APS).
The Scottish Government publishes its own analysis on underemployment in Scotland based on the ONS LFS and APS data. The most recent publication including this data is Scotland’s Labour Market Insights: July 2024 publication. This can be found at: https://www.gov.scot/publications/scotlands-labour-market-insights-july-2024/pages/people-in-work. The report highlights that an estimated 5.9 per cent of those in employment in Scotland were underemployed, the joint lowest in the series.
The Scottish Government is working with Welsh and Northern Irish Governments and our colleagues in ONS to better understand and to guide improvements in the collection of this data.