Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps she is taking to ensure her Department complies with section 2.1.6 of the Civil Service Management Code; and whether that monitoring data gathered is shared with union representatives.

The Civil Service has made good progress in recent years in diversifying its workforce. The percentage of civil servants from an ethnic minority background is at 15.0% and the percentage of those who declare themselves disabled is at 14.0%. Staff who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or other (LGBO) is 6.1% and the proportion of female civil servants stands at 54.5%. These rates are all at their highest recorded levels. However, we know there is more to be achieved to ensure we are representative of the citizens we serve across all our grades.

The new Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy 2022-2025 recognises our success and builds on this good work to encourage a broader range of people into the Civil Service to give depth to our understanding of contemporary society in the United Kingdom. It provides the necessary framing for diversity and inclusion activity in the Civil Service as part of our wider workforce strategy, and through that, how the Civil Service delivers for its people, the government and our citizens.

A link to the Civil Service statistics can be found at the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/civil-service-statistics

The Home Office undertakes the collation of diversity data of our workforce, which includes age, gender, ethnic origin, disability, and (in Northern Ireland) community background of staff and applicants as set out in para 2.1.6 in the civil service management code. This data is used to undertake monitoring and analysis of recruitment, career development including progression, resignations, personal review, salary, performance pay, and access to opportunities for training and personal development. This data is also used to ensure the department discharges its public sector equality duties under s.149 the Equality Act 2010; data is used to routinely inform equality impact assessments where appropriate to effectively consider the different impacts of policies, processes and services across the workforce.

The Home Office also captures data on the professions and job roles which our people undertake. This allows us to understand and monitor the diversity of our workforce in professions and business areas. The Home Office publishes its workforce data annually on GOV.UK

The Home Office is fully committed to the provision of diversity data to its recognised trade unions with available information supplied on a regular basis. However, it should be noted that section 2.1.6 of the Civil Service Management Code (CSMC) does not place an obligation on the department to share the information collected on staff and applicants with their representative trade unions.

Detailed information on the Civil Service workforce is collected and published centrally as part of the Annual Civil Service Employment Statistics.