About the Civil Service
Civil Service Statistics 2004 annual report
In section navigation
Entrants and leavers
More people entered the Civil Service during the year ending 31 March 2004 than left it. The number of entrants (including industrials) was 54,530, whereas the number of leavers (including industrials) was 46,470. Tables AE, AF and AG present information on the number of people entering each of the major government departments (including agencies), together with details on ethnic origin, disability status and gender respectively. Tables AI , AJ and AK present the same information but for leavers. Tables AH and AL show the responsibility level, age and gender for entrants and leavers respectively for the subset of Civil Service staff reported to Mandate only (see Sources and Definitions ). Great attention should be paid to the source of each table, especially when performing year-on-year comparisons.
Entrants - diversity
Of the 54,530 permanent entrants to the Civil Service some 10.4 per cent were from ethnic minority backgrounds, 1.2 per cent declared a disability and around 52.5 per cent were female.
Table AG shows that the proportion of female entrants was highest in the Crown Prosecution Service, with 70.3 per cent, and the Department for Education and Skills with 66.8 per cent.
Table AH shows that the greatest concentration of entrants was in the lower age bands, with 47.5 per cent of people entering the Civil Service doing so before the age of 30. Around 40.2 per cent of entrants were between the ages of 30 and 49 and some 12.3 per cent joined the Civil Service aged 50 or over.
- Table AE: Entrants by department and ethnic origin
- Table AF: Entrants by department and disability status
- Table AG: Entrants by department and gender
- Table AH: Entrants by responsibility level, age and gender
Leavers - diversity
Of the 46,470 leavers from the Civil Service some 8.6 per cent were from ethnic minority backgrounds ( Table AI ), 3.9 per cent declared a disability ( Table AJ ) and 49.3 cent were female ( Table AK ).
Table AL shows the ages of leavers by gender. Some 36.1 per cent of leavers were aged between 30 and 49. Around 33.5 per cent of those leaving the Civil Service did so before the age of 30 and about 30.3 per cent left aged 50 or over.
- Table AI: Leavers by department and ethnic origin
- Table AJ: Leavers by department and disability status
- Table AK: Leavers by department and gender
- Table AL: Leavers by responsibility level, age and gender
Diversity: Non-response
The data regarding the diversity of entrants and leavers are affected by the same issues as data for the diversity of staff in post. The question of non-response is particularly prominent for entrants as staff records may not yet have been updated by their new department. For example, we do not know the ethnic background of 49.0 per cent of entrants for the year ending 31 March 2004 . Therefore, Civil Service Statistics on ethnic origin and disability should be interpreted with some caution.