Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body
Equality Monitoring
Summary Report 2012/13
Introduction
As the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body (SPCB) we are committed to
providing a Parliament that is open and accessible to all groups in society and where
everyone is treated equally with dignity and respect. This is reflected in the way in
which we conduct our business where equality is embedded into our everyday
decision making and planning to ensure that we respond positively to the diverse
needs of our members, staff, visitors and members of the public.
The SPCB, over the past year, has supported a number of initiatives, demonstrating
our continued commitment to equality, and showing how we are dedicated to
ensuring equality is embedded in the decision making process at every level of the
organisation. To demonstrate this progress, we have published our Annual Equality
Monitoring Report for 2012/13, which now includes an Equality Monitoring Survey,
allowing us to report on all of the protected characteristics.
This paper is a summary of the full Equality Monitoring Report for 2012/13. It aims
to provide the key highlights from the report and is aligned to the four key priority
areas, set out in the SPCB strategic plan 2011-16. These include:
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Supporting Parliamentary business;
The Scottish Parliamentary Service;
Supporting Members; and
Services to the public.
In each of these areas, we demonstrated our main achievements and progress
towards achieving equality. We also took the opportunity to reflect on our existing
practices and identify where further improvement may be required. To summarise
the findings, we have provided a brief overview of the main achievements; the
diversity profile of the Scottish Parliamentary Service (SPS); and our commitments
for the year ahead.
Key Achievements
1. Modern Apprenticeship Scheme (MAS) - Improving the age diversity profile
of staff
For the last three years, data monitoring on age has shown that there were no staff
under the age of 24 employed within the Parliament. One of the ways for the SPCB
to address this imbalance has been the launch of the Modern Apprenticeship
Scheme. This operates under the Edinburgh Guarantee initiative, which brings
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together businesses from across Edinburgh to work towards increasing the number
of jobs and training opportunities being made available to young people in the
Edinburgh area. We ran a pilot scheme this year, providing two young people with
apprenticeships involving a two-year structured workplace training programme,
including an SVQ Level 3 in Business and Administration. Subject to the completion
of their SVQ and apprenticeships, these individuals will be in a strong position to
apply for posts within the SPS. Should the pilot scheme be successful, the SPCB
aims to continue the initiative as a longer-term programme which will consequently
aid the broadening of age diversity within the SPS workforce.
2. Community Engagement
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Accessible Information and Access to Proceedings
The SPCB has made a commitment to increasing engagement with
underrepresented groups. In the past year there have been several key
developments in the provision of information related to parliamentary proceedings to
the public, as the SPCB recognises the changes that are occurring with regard to
access and information delivery methods. These have included:
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Making greater use of web and social media channels to provide information
to wider and more diverse audiences. Examples of this are the use of
Facebook and Twitter to send out key messages about parliamentary
proceedings; and the addition of all parliamentary videos to YouTube. Specific
examples are outlined below:
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Rural Affairs; Climate Change and Environment; and Local
Government and Regeneration Committees have embraced the use of
social media through membership and active participation on Twitter.
Equal Opportunities Committee summary of recommendations in
‘Where Gypsy/Travellers Live’ report was published and brought to the
attention of stakeholders through the Committee’s newsletter and
Twitter feed.
Events promotion via short video links uploaded to the Parliament
Webpages – ‘Parliament Days’; ‘The Carers Parliament’; and ‘The
Festival of Politics’
Online leaflets with images and summary reports to communicate key
messages to the public. This builds on the accessibility of information to the
public in general and ensures that information is more readily accessible to
groups or individuals who find more traditional methods of communication
more challenging (such as people who have learning difficulties and/or
learning disabilities; people who have communication support needs; and
people who are blind or visually impaired, or deaf or hard of hearing).
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In order to build on the success of these initiatives, training will be rolled out in
November 2013 to staff detailing how to improve the accessibility of online content,
and highlight different methods of communication through online means.
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Subtitling
The SPCB has been researching options for providing subtitling with the aim of
increasing accessibility not only to people who are deaf or hard of hearing but also to
anyone who would benefit from text on screen to aid their understanding (for
example, those whose first language is not English). Whilst live subtitling is still far
from an automated process, and hence costly, a possible solution has been
identified to add subtitles to recorded material where a transcript is available.
Technology is not yet at a stage where subtitles can be automatically generated
during a live broadcast with any accuracy using voice recognition; however, voice
recognition can be used to aid the synchronising of a transcript to a video track.
Initial tests show that this works very well for material where there is a close match
between the available transcript and the video track. A piloted subtitling service will
be provided in October 2013.
3. Time for Reflection
Time for Reflection has continued to increase its diversity over the period,
representing a wider range of people from different faiths and with no faith. The
programme between April and March also included disabled contributors who for
example had a speech impairment following laryngeal cancer.
Diversity Profile of the Scottish Parliamentary Service
Every year we monitor the diversity profile of our staff to identify any groups who
may be underrepresented in the workforce. This is the first year the SPCB can report
on all of the protected characteristics as a result of a new electronic HR system
(eHR) that has been developed allowing staff to update their personal information on
the protected characteristics. The Human Resources Office asked staff to provide
this information as part of an Equality Monitoring Survey in summer 2012.
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Disability - There is no change in the number of staff who declared a
disability – this remains static at 8.9% which is comparable with the 10% of
disabled people who are economically active in the labour market.
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Race -Staff reporting that they are from a Black and Minority Ethnic (BME)
background remains significantly low, at 0.9%. This has fallen from 1.4% in
2011/12. The BME Scottish population is now estimated to be at 5%
according to the 2011 Census results although the core data is not yet
available. As we recognise that BME staff are underrepresented in the
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workforce, we aim to look at this further as part of a wider project on the agility
of the workforce.
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Religion and Belief - Nearly half of the staff within the SPS (46%) responded
as having no faith. Of the remaining responses, 39% reflected Christian faith,
and 4.8% reflected other religious faiths.
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Gender - There is a 49:51% male/female split within the organisation which is
comparable with the previous year’s report of 51:49% male/female split.
These figures reflect the gender diversity within the Scottish population which
is made up of 48% male and 52% female.
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Gender and part-time status - In terms of part time status, the report shows
that 22% of staff work part time within the SPS (compared to 21% last year).
In line with the findings for last year, the male/female split of men and women
working part time is 30:70%. The national figure for men working part time is
13% and for women is 43%. The SPS figures show that 13.6% of men work
part time and 29.6% of women work part time.
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Gender and Grade - The breakdown of women and men at grade 6 and
above has remained as per last year – a split of 65:35%, male/female. At
Leadership Group level (grade 7 plus), the split is also as it was last year, at
82:18% male/female. The Solicitor to the Parliament (a post held by a female)
is not included in these figures – the split inclusive of this post would be
73:27% male/female.
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Age - There has been an increase in the number of employees under the age
of 24 – from 0.2% in 2011/12 to 1.5% in 2012/13. This demonstrates the
success of the SPCB’s introduction of the Modern Apprenticeship
Programme, as outlined above. The majority of staff are aged 40 years and
above (63.9%), similarly reflected in the previous year. This is demonstrative
of the low turnover of staff within the organisation.
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Sexual Orientation and Transgender - Figures for this year show that 3.4%
of SPS staff have described themselves as Lesbian, Gay or Bisexual (LGB).
As this is the first year of reporting on this protected characteristic, there is no
figure for comparison. It should also be noted that there were 25 ‘prefer not to
answer’ responses. Whilst a question was asked about transgender, the
response was too low to be able to report on it.
Looking Ahead
Overall, the Equality Monitoring Report for 2012/13 has demonstrated how equality
touches every part of the organisation and underpins all decision-making and
interaction. In addition, the report has helped us to reflect on what we have achieved
and to focus on areas for further development. While we have committed to a
number of actions for the year ahead under the SPCB Equality Action Plan 2011-16,
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we have also included below the actions specifically identified through this year’s
reporting on equality.
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We intend to continue to improve the service provision for people with autism,
by participating in the Autism Access Award;
 We will continue to explore the use of BSL and other digital formats to make
parliamentary business more accessible to members of the public, and will
provide additional training to improve the accessibility of online content for
members of the public; and
 Engagement with under-represented groups will be monitored with a view to
establishing means to improve such engagement. This will be achieved
through, for example, the Parliament Days programme (introduced in early
2013).
Further Information
If you would like any further information on how the SPCB implements its equality
practices, please contact Aneela McKenna, Equalities Manager on 0131 348 6853 or
by email: aneela.mckenna@scottish.parliament.uk who will be able to provide you
with any advice/ guidance on all SPCB equality related matters.
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