APS Employment Data 31 December 2020 release

This release of the Australian Public Service (APS) employment data presents a statistical outline of the APS workforce employed under the Public Service Act 1999. It provides key workforce metrics as at 31 December 2020 and trends from 2001. A full set of data tables are available in Appendix 1.

This data release complements the Australian Public Service Commissioner’s annual State of the Service Report, which draws on a range of information sources including the biannual December data release.

This current APS employment data release covers 98 agencies. Any agencies without APS staff at 31 December 2020 are excluded from reporting.

The Australian Public Service Employment Database

Each year a snapshot of data concerning all APS employees as at 30 June and 31 December is released by the Australian Public Service Commission. The data is provided by agencies and is drawn from the Australian Public Service Employment Database.

APS employment data includes:

• Demographic variables including age, gender and work location
• Classification level of APS employees, from trainee to Senior Executive Service
• Diversity data including voluntary items self-reported by APS staff such as disability status, Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander status, and cultural diversity
• Staff movements including engagements, promotions, transfers between agencies and separations.

The reported size of the APS workforce is a headcount of all people employed at the time of the snapshot. This figure does not adjust for hours worked and it includes any employees who are on extended leave (for 3 months or more), including those on maternity leave and leave without pay.

This figure is different to Average Staffing Level (ASL) data provided in the Federal Budget papers. The ASL counts staff for the time they work. For example, a full time employee is counted as one ASL, while a part time employee who works three days per week contributes 0.6 of an ASL. The ASL averages staffing over an annual period. It is not a point in time calculation.

The Government places a cap on ASL. This is applied across the General Government Sector (which incorporates all of the APS and a range of other government agencies). ASL caps are published in the Federal Budget Papers each year, budget.gov.au.

Another measure of employee numbers used by both private and public sector organisations is Full Time Equivalent (FTE). This is a count of all hours worked at a point in time and then converted to the number of full time staff. For example, two staff each working three days per week would be counted as 1.2 FTE.

For further details on the APS employment database, including its scope, see the Australian Public Service Commission’s APSED page.

Interactive data—APSEDii

APSED data is also available via a series of interactive dashboards called the APSED interactive interface (APSEDii).

You can access current APS workforce data, including trend data here. If you would like to request any other workforce metrics, please contact us at APSED@apsc.gov.au.

Feedback

The APSC is committed to providing readers with the information they require in the most useful format, and feedback is welcome. Please e-mail APSED@apsc.gov.au if you would like to provide any comments.