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Departmental Disabled Staff

Volume 506: debated on Friday 26 February 2010

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how many and what proportion of staff in (a) his Department and (b) the executive agencies for which he is responsible are disabled; and what the average salary in (i) his Department and (ii) the executive agencies is of (A) full-time disabled staff, (B) full-time non-disabled staff, (C) part-time disabled staff and (D) part-time non-disabled staff. (317894)

The requirement to make a declaration about disability is voluntary and significant numbers of staff have chosen not to make a disclosure. Overall, within the Ministry of Justice (excluding the National Offender Management Services (NOMS)) 73 per cent. have completed a declaration. Among full-time staff 58 per cent. have completed a declaration form, with 3.9 per cent. recording that they have a disability. Among part-time staff 3.5 per cent. declared a disability.

For NOMS, 55 per cent. of directly employed staff have completed a declaration, with 6 per cent. recording that they have a disability. Among full-time staff 55 per cent. completed a declaration, of whom 6 per cent. declared a disability and among part-time staff 58 per cent. completed a declaration and 6 per cent. of those declared a disability.

2 per cent. of senior civil servants (SCS) employed within the Ministry have declared a disability. As the actual number of SCS staff involved is less than 10, any disclosure of their working patterns and average salaries may lead to individual identification.

For staff employed in grades below the SCS, insufficient numbers of employees have made any declaration of their status in relation to disability to enable the Ministry to determine, with any accuracy, average salary information.

However, during 2008-09 (the latest figures available) the average salary for full-time staff employed in the Ministry of Justice (excluding National Offender Management Services (NOMS)) was £23,986 and the average full-time equivalent (FTE) salary for part-time staff for 2008-09 was £20,717. For staff employed within NOMS, at 31 January 2010 the average full-time salary was £24,876 and the average FTE salary for part-time staff was £23,986.

Both the Ministry of Justice and NOMS encourages staff to declare relevant information to assist with diversity monitoring.