The Improvement Service has contributed to the publication of a new report on the current state of the workforce in Scottish local authorities.
Prepared by Scotland’s most senior local authority officials, the report warns that councils are operating in a difficult economic, financial and labour market situation, with a range of ongoing organisational and workforce pressures.
Scotland’s Local Authority Workforce Report 2024 is the product of research undertaken by Solace Scotland, which represents council Chief Executives and Senior Managers, the Society of Personal Development Scotland (SPDS) and the Improvement Service (IS).
The report also highlights the excellent work already being undertaken by councils to address these challenges and showcases a number of examples of innovative best practice that have been adopted across the country as a means to mitigate workforce risks.
These include working with further and higher education on building routes into hard-to-fill local government roles and bringing more young people into the council workforce, as well as supporting the mental health and wellbeing of existing staff.
Recommendations from the report include the exploration of collaborative approaches to tackling staff recruitment and retention in key areas of concern and working with COSLA and national government on projections to improve understanding of the relationship between local, regional and national workforce planning.
Councils have experienced staff retention and recruitment challenges in a range of operational services, many of which are the result of post-pandemic changes in their local labour market. This includes difficulties replacing experienced female workers who have opted to leave employment to support family and other caring responsibilities.
The research shows that almost all councils have critical workforce gaps for social care roles (97%) and social workers (91%). Mental health officers, planners, environmental health officers, occupational therapists, building standards officers and trading standards officers were also among those occupations that councils find the most challenging to recruit. The research showed that for the vast majority of councils, workforce planning or workforce gaps appeared on council’s risk registers (94%) and that is it an area of significant concern for councils.
Dawn Roberts, Chief Executive Dumfries and Galloway Council, Solace Scotland lead for workforce said:
“The sustainability of our valued local government workforce is critical to ensuring we can transform how we deliver our vital services. This report sets out not only the challenges we are experiencing in local government, but also positive examples and innovative practices across councils which are helping to show the career opportunities we have in local government.
“The launch of this report provides an important opportunity to work collaboratively with our sector partners to develop a sustainable workforce for the future.”
Elaine Barrie, Chair of SPDS, added:
“The workforce report provides a comprehensive overview of recruitment and retention challenges across a wide range of staff groups, experienced by all councils.
“There is commitment to building a strong diverse workforce for the future through partnership with our university and colleges and a real appetite for innovative approaches in councils.”
Sarah Gadsden, Chief Executive of the Improvement, said:
“This is a valuable and important piece of research, and the Improvement Service has been delighted to lend our expertise to this work.”
“The local government sector is experiencing workforce challenges, and we hope that this report will lead to a better understanding of the issues and new solutions to help councils recruit and retain key members of staff.”
Andy Witty, Director of Strategic Policy at Colleges Scotland, welcomed the report:
“This report highlights the challenges local authorities are facing in providing the broad range of training and development for staff. Colleges across the country can ably provide councils with a broad range of great opportunities for staff to upskill and develop.
“Social care and other high priority areas are where colleges will work closely with local authorities to find collaborative approaches, addressing skills shortages by producing graduates at the right time with the right experience and qualifications.
“Colleges are a core part of Scottland’s regional skills planning, and enhancing the relationship between local authorities and colleges will no doubt benefit both.”