Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government uses various official data sources to assess these issues

The use of reported Zero Hours Contracts in Scotland’s labour market is lower than in the UK as whole. (Scotland 2.2%, UK2.8%).  

The ONS publish information on Zero hours contracts available at the following link: https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/pe.opleinwork/earningsandworkinghours/articles/contractsthatdonotguaranteeaminimumnumberofhours/mar2017

In 2016 Scotland remains the best performing of all four UK countries with the highest proportion of employees paid the Living Wage or more (79.9%) and the number of Scots-based Accredited Living Wage Employers is now over 785.

Information on earnings and the living wage are, sourced from the Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings and published by the Scottish Government at: http://www.gov.scot/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Labour-Market/Earnings

In the period, Jan 2016-Dec 2016 130,000 employees held temporary positions (5.8% of all employees), a decrease from 136,000 (6% of all employees) in Jan 2015–Dec 2015. Information on temporary employment is published by the ONS in Table HI11-3 published at: https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/datasets/headlinelabourforcesurveyindicatorsforscotlandhi11

The Scottish Government (SG) is subject to Public Sector Pay Policy and as such does not pay performance bonuses or other performance related payments to staff below Senior Civil Service (SCS) level. The pay of SCS is a reserved matter and operates within the UK Cabinet Office pay and performance management framework; the current SCS pay system, which has been in existence since 2001, is performance related. The SG’s senior management team determine the SG SCS pay strategy each year in accordance with UK Cabinet Office pay framework and with due regard to Scottish Public Sector Pay Policy. In line with the latter, it has not awarded any non-consolidated performance payments to SG SCS staff in the last five years.

There are two exceptions where performance payments have been paid:

A payment was made to a single SCS member of staff under a contractual arrangement agreed at the time the individual commenced employment.

A payment was made in December 2015 to an individual who transferred to the SG from another (UK) Government Department and payment was made on behalf of the exporting organisation.

Further details have been withheld as it may enable identification of the specific members of staff.

Detail of the gender pay gap in the Scottish Government was given in answer to question S5W-07834 on 21 March 2017. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at: http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

The Scottish Government will abolish fees for employment tribunals once it is clear how the transfer of powers and responsibilities will work.

In line with commitments in both the Labour Market Strategy and the 2016 Programme for Government, we have established the Employment Tribunals Stakeholders’ Forum, which will help frame how we can best use our new powers around employment tribunals to ensure that any new system in Scotland, based on the abolition of fees, will meet the needs of employees, businesses and society.

The Scottish Government is continuing to consider, and to discuss with key stakeholders, the matters raised in the consultation responses. However, the Scottish Government is not in a position to issue a final response to its consultation as the drafting of the Order in Council (OiC), which sets out the powers of the employment tribunals to be devolved, is in the hands of the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and is not complete. In addition, the Scottish Government has not yet had sight of any proposed OiC provisions relating to the devolution of specified functions of the Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT). As a number of the consultation responses have highlighted, there needs to be an appropriate ‘fit’ between what is proposed in relation to the Employment Tribunals (ET) and the EAT and therefore a significant piece of the jigsaw is missing. Scottish Government will share further drafts of the ET provisions and will consult on the provisions relating to the EAT, once available.

I have written to UK Government Ministers seeking clarification on timing and to date have not received proposals outlining when responsibility for the management and operation of the employment tribunal will transfer.

In the meantime discussions between the UK Government and the Scottish Government are continuing.

The most recently published estimates for the 2016 gender pay gap for Scotland based on median hourly earnings (excluding overtime) show that :

The overall gender pay gap for full-time and part-time workers in Scotland is 15.6%.

For part-time workers, the gender pay gap is -9.6%.

For full-time workers, the gender pay gap is 6.2%.

Source: Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings, ONS

Note: The gender pay gap is calculated as the difference between men’s and women’s median hourly earnings as a percentage of men’s median hourly earnings. A negative figure indicates that female earnings exceed male earnings

Estimates of the gender pay gap for all and full-time employees, can be found on the Scottish Government web site at the following location:

http://www.gov.scot/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Labour-Market/Earnings/ASHE-SGTables

Table 2.1: Gender Pay Gap – Median Full-time Hourly Earnings (excluding overtime) by Country, 1997-2016

Table 3.1: Gender Pay Gap – Median Hourly Earnings (excluding overtime) - All employees by Country 1997-2016.

The gender pay gap, based on hourly earnings (excluding overtime) for part-time employees is published by the Office for National Statistics and can be found at the following location:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/earningsandworkinghours/adhocs/006269annualsurveyofhoursandearningsashegenderpaygapbycountryapril1997to2016

The UK Government’s Public Sector Gender Pay Gap Reporting Regulations came into force on 31 March 2017. The Regulations allow public authorities 12 months to publish their gender pay gap information. Until public authorities have undertaken this process and the results are published and can be evaluated, it is not possible to say whether this reporting mechanism will give a comprehensive and robust picture of the public sector gender pay gap. The Scottish Government will consider the results from the first year’s reporting, and working with the Equality and Human Rights Commission, factor this into the areas covered in the planned review of the Public Sector Equality Duty Scottish Specific Duties, which will begin later this year.

The Scottish Government has funded the Mark Scott Leadership for Life Award through the Outward Bound Trust from 2012-13. The funding broken down by financial year:

£220,000 in 2012-13;

£200,000 in 2013-14;

£180,000 in 2014-15;

£100,000 in 2015-16;

£75,000 in 2016-17.

The Scottish Government has committed a further £75,000 of funding in 2017-18 for the Award.

Responsibility for Scotland’s Census lies with the Registrar General for Scotland and National Records of Scotland (NRS). Their report of the 2021 Census Topic Consultation (published August 2016) provides information about the feedback they received and outlines their intended next steps. It highlights that whilst NRS proposes to recommend that information on economic activity, occupation and industry should continue to be collected in the 2021 Census, they are seeking further information on potential questions, or changes to questions, on: the last year worked, supervisory status, hours worked, and voluntary and unpaid work.

NRS confirms that they will be working throughout 2017 to research these issues and the question set that will be subsequently proposed to the Scottish Parliament. This process is underway and discussions are being sought with a range of stakeholders. As part of this, NRS intends engaging with the Scottish Parliament and its committees.

Data from the ONS’ Labour Force Survey for the most recent quarter (December to February 2017) shows that the economic inactivity rate was 23.0 per cent.

The most recent data available on reason for inactivity from the ONS’ Labour Force Survey indicates that the largest increases were seen amongst students and those long-term sick or disabled (both up 30,000 over the year to October to December 2016).

Many economically inactive people are students, retired or are looking after family and home, however having a long-term illness or disability accounts for 30% of those aged 16 to 64 who are economically inactive.