We have a responsibility for workforce data and intelligence on the social service workforce in Scotland

Our aim is to produce workforce data, information and intelligence for employers and other stakeholders that support the development of the sector.

Data collection

We undertake two main workforce data collections in December each year:

• a survey of local authority social work services (LASWS)  to gather data on those working in local authority social work services which are not registered care services as defined under the Regulation of Care (Scotland) Act 2001
• a survey of people employed as Mental Health Officers (MHOs) by local authorities.

Publications

We publish two main reports each year.

• The Scottish Social Services Workforce Data report (an Official Statistics publication) using the LASWS survey data and workforce data collected by the Care Inspectorate from all registered care services.
• The Mental Health Officers report (a National Statistics publication) using the MHO survey data.

We also publish a number of other workforce reports, some occasional:

• sector skills assessments
• workforce skills reports
• SVQ uptake reports.

Explore the data

Our Workforce Data website allows you to create your own charts and tables using the data we have available on workforce using the Explore the Data section. You can create visualisations by area and compare data. The website also provides access to more detailed information including:

• detailed workforce data
• local authority social worker data tool
• local authority post types data.

Official Statistics and National Statistics

We are an Official Statistics and National Statistics provider which means we comply with the UK Statistics Authority (UKSA) Code of Practice for Statistics.