Statistical Publication Notice

26 June 2007

NHSScotland Workforce Statistics  

INTRODUCTION

Workforce related information about all staff working in NHSScotland are available on the website.  This release covers annual figures for nursing and midwifery vacancies, allied health professional vacancies, use of bank and agency nurses, sickness absence and equality and diversity information.  It also includes quarterly staff in post figures for consultants.

KEY POINTS

• The number of nursing and midwifery vacancies has decreased.  The vacancy rate is currently 2.8%.
• The number of nursing and midwifery students in training has increased to nearly 10,000.
• The usage of bank and agency nurses has increased.
• The overall time lost due to sickness absence in NHSScotland is 5.55%.

INTERPRETATION

The tables present figures in both Headcount numbers and Whole Time Equivalents (WTE).  WTEs adjust headcount staff figures to take account of part-time staff.

An employee may hold more than one appointment in NHSScotland. Their appointments may be in more than one NHS organisation, in more than one region, in more than one specialty, or in more than one grade.  This issue must be considered when using tables showing Headcount figures as the employee is counted under each organisation / region / specialty / grade they work in but only once in the total. Tables showing WTE figures are not affected.

Agency Nursing
Previously a combination of contracted and non-contracted agencies was used.  However by investing in the use of the nurse bank and contracted agencies a decrease in the use of non-contracted agencies has occurred.  As a result a significant decrease in expenditure during 2006/07 can be found.

DETAILED SUMMARY

Nursing & Midwifery

The number of Nursing and Midwifery vacancies decreased from 2082.8 on 31st March 2006 to 1671.8 on 31st March 2007. The vacancy rate decreased from 3.6% to 2.8%. The corresponding staff in post figures were 57,338.5, an increase of 970 (1.7%) from 31st March 2005.

The number of nursing and midwifery students in Scottish Higher Education Institutions is also at an all time high with 9,909 students in initial entrant (pre-registration) training in 2006. 

The use of agency nursing and midwifery staff increased by 7.4% from 678.1 average WTE for the year ending 31st March 2006 to 728.2 average WTE for the year ending 31st March 2007.  Over this period a decrease of 194 average WTE (43.5%) can be seen in the use of registered agency nursing and midwifery staff.  The cost of employing agency nursing and midwifery staff decreased by £8 million (30.5%) over the same period.

The use of bank nursing and midwifery staff increased by 25.8% from 2797.1 average WTE for the year ending 31st March 2006 to 3519.0 average WTE for the year ending 31st March 2007.  The cost of employing these staff rose by 13.7% from £69.1 million to £78.5 million over the same period.

Allied Health Professionals  

The number of AHP vacancies at 31st March 2007 was 372.9 a increase of 9.7 from 31st March 2006. The vacancy rate was 3.9% at 31st March 2007; this rate remains the same compared to the previous year.  The corresponding staff in post figures were 9,206.4, an increase of 485.4 (5.6%) from 31st March 2006.

Consultants

Quarterly consultant figures show that at 31st March 2007, NHSScotland employed 3,683.9 whole time equivalent consultants, an increase of 49.6 (1.4%) from 31st December 2006, when the figure was 3,634.3 whole time equivalent.

Sickness Absence

The overall time lost due to sickness absence in NHSScotland was 5.55% for the year ending 31st March 2007. The calculation has been revised for the 2007 data to provide a more robust absence rate.

Equality and Diversity

At 31st March 2007, data on ethnic group was available for 49.21% of the NHSScotland workforce, an increase from 40.24% as at 31st March 2006. At 31st March 2007, data on religion was available for 41.07% of the workforce, an increase from 31.11% as at 31st March 2006.

Changes for 2006

Agenda for Change

Information presented on the "Workforce Statistics" web pages is changing to reflect the introduction of Agenda for Change.  Agenda for Change is the new national NHS pay and terms and conditions system for NHS workers.  It replaces the previous Whitley Council system and is one of the key reform elements of the Pay Modernisation Agenda, focused on the need to deliver more effective patient-centred care, better value for money, and redesign of services.

NHS Boards are currently operating a phased approach to assimilation of staff to Agenda for Change and full assimilation has not yet been achieved. In order to provide the fullest detail possible, figures will be presented in the same groupings as for previous years.  Details for employees who have already been assimilated to Agenda for Change have been ‘mapped back’ as far as possible to the coding used under Whitley to ensure consistency in trend data and where this has not been possible data are not shown for 2006 and 2007. In particular Nursing and Midwifery vacancy data are available at NHS Board level only.

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MAIN CONTACTS:

Bill Ramsay
Senior Information Analyst
0131 275 7568
william.ramsay@isd.csa.scot.nhs.uk

GLOSSARY:

Headcount and Whole Time Equivalent (WTE) figures
The tables present figures in both Headcount numbers and Whole Time Equivalents (WTE).  WTEs adjust headcount staff figures to take account of part-time staff.
An employee may hold more than one appointment in NHSScotland. Their appointments may be in more than one NHS organisation, in more than one region, in more than one specialty, or in more than one grade.  This issue must be considered when using tables showing Headcount figures as the employee is counted under each organisation / region / specialty / grade they work in but only once in the total. Tables showing WTE figures are not affected.

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PRE-RELEASE ACCESS TO THIS PUBLICATION WAS GIVEN TO:

HISTORY OF THIS PUBLICATION:

Last Published:  29 June 2006
Next Due:  June 2008
Data Available Since:  Nursing & Midwifery and Allied Health Professional vacancies since 1999
Consultant staff in post - paper publication since 1970s, web publications since 1996
Equality and Diversity - web based since 2006
Sickness Absence since 2001