Department for Education: Bullying

(asked on 14th February 2019) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what proportion of (a) disabled and (b) all other staff in her Department reported experiencing bullying or harassment at work in the most recent Civil Service People Survey.


Answered by
Anne Milton Portrait
Anne Milton
This question was answered on 25th February 2019

Bullying and harassment has no place in any workplace, including the Civil Service.

The Department for Education has highlighted tackling bullying and harassment as one of its three diversity and inclusion priorities for 2019. It recently appointed fair treatment ambassadors on all of its sites to provide support and advice to people who report bullying or harassment, and has also provided training for managers on inclusive leadership, disability awareness and unconscious bias.

In the most recent People Survey, 11% of respondents across the Civil Service, on average, told us that they had experienced bullying or harassment at work in the 12 months preceding the survey. Whilst this figure has remained stable since 2016, we recognise that certain groups of staff are more likely to say than others that they have experienced this type of unacceptable behaviour. This includes staff members with long-term limiting conditions who, in the vast majority of departments and agencies, were more likely to say that they had been bullied or harassed in the last 12 months than staff members with no long-term limiting conditions. We are strengthening the routes for staff to report bullying and harassment to make sure that all staff are fully supported throughout the process and to make sure that the cultures are positive and inclusive.

The high level People Survey results for each organisation, including reported rates of bullying and harassment, were published last December on GOV.UK. Each spring, the Cabinet Office conducts and publishes a range of further analysis on the People Survey responses, including the results by gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation and health status. Similar analysis will be conducted again this year and made available on GOV.UK. In the meantime, the results for the 2017 survey are summarised in the attached table. A copy of this table has been placed in the Houses of both Libraries.

Data on health status for the Civil Service People Survey 2017, which are arranged by organisation, can be found in the attached table. Long-term health status is captured in the People Survey through questions J04 and J04A. J04 asks if the individual has a "long-standing physical or mental health condition, illness, impairment or disability?" and, if they answer yes, J04A asks whether their condition, illness or disability has an impact on their daily activity or the work they can do.

Results are aggregated in to two broad categories: "No long-term limiting condition", combining those who answer No to either J04 or J04A; and, "Long-term limiting condition", those who answer Yes to J04 and who answer that their condition limits what they can do either "a little" or "a lot" at J04A.

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