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ONGOING AND NON-ONGOING STAFF

Ongoing staff numbers increased during the past year, but a decline in non-ongoing numbers meant that there was an overall decline in APS staffing.

ONGOING STAFF

At June 2004 there were 122,102 ongoing staff in the APS, an increase of 1.6% from June 2003. This increase extended the growth of the previous few years, although at a much lower rate than the 7.1% in the year to June 2003, 3.3% in the year to June 2002, and 5.4% in the year to June 2001. It may well be that recent growth has now plateaued.

While numbers increased for both men and women, the increase was much greater for women (2.3%) than for men (0.8%). These trends are shown in Figure 2.3.

Figure 2.3: Ongoing staff by sex, 1995 to 2004

Source: APSED

During 2003—04, women’s representation increased from 52.8% to 53.1%, continuing the trend that has been evident for many years. Their representation at higher classifications also continued to rise: at June 2004, women comprised 31.6% of the SES (an increase from 30.1% at June 2003) and 39.3% of Executive Level (EL) employees (up from 37.9% the previous year).

The largest increases in ongoing staff numbers were in DIMIA which increased by 397 or 9.7%, the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (DAFF) (395 or 11.2%) and ATO (248 or 1.2%). Smaller agencies that increased in size were the Australian Crime Commission (ACC) (78 or 32.9%) and CrimTrac (10 or 29.4%). The largest decreases in ongoing staff numbers were in Centrelink (262 or 1.0%) and the Australian Customs Service (Customs) (202 or 4.1%).

NON-ONGOING STAFF

During the year, the number of non-ongoing staff fell significantly from 11,498 to 9420, a decrease of 18.1%. This was the first year since 1999—00 that non-ongoing staff numbers fell in absolute terms, although their share of total staff numbers has been falling for most of the past decade. Almost all of the decline in non-ongoing staff numbers was in Centrelink (down from 1980 in 2003 to 542 in 2004) and ATO (down from 2175 to 1232). Figure 2.4 provides details of non-ongoing staff as a proportion of total staff from 1995 to 2004. It shows that the proportion of non-ongoing employment for both men and women has generally declined over the decade, but the proportion of women has been consistently higher than that of men.

Figure 2.4: Non-ongoing staff as a proportion of total staff, 1995 to 2004

Source: APSED

The decline during the last year has, however, been much greater for women: their numbers dropped from 7366 to 5861 (a decrease of 20.4%) during 2003—04, compared with a drop from 4132 to 3559 (a decrease of 13.9%) for men.

As a proportion of total staff, non-ongoing employment dropped from 8.7% to 7.2% over the year to June 2004. The proportion of men fell from 6.8% to 5.9%, and that of women from 10.4% to 8.3%.

The substantial reduction may be explained in part by the continued restructuring of the APS involving a steady decline in lower level and unskilled jobs. Non-ongoing employees are concentrated at lower classification levels, with 69.9% at APS 1—4 levels, compared with only 43.2% of ongoing staff. Almost half of APS 1 staff (46.6%) are non-ongoing, as are a quarter of APS 2s (24.0%). As Figure 2.5 shows, the representation of non-ongoing staff at higher classifications is much lower.

The decline in non-ongoing employment during the year was particularly evident at lower classification levels, with a drop of 51.8% in the number of non-ongoing APS 4s (from 2502 at June 2003 to 1205 at June 2004), and a 25.4% drop for APS 2s (from 2665 to 1988 over the same period). This resulted in a decrease in APS 1—2 numbers overall of 6.3%, compared to the decrease in total APS employment of 0.2%.

Women account for 62.2% of non-ongoing employees, but are particularly concentrated at lower classifications. Women outnumber men in non-ongoing employment at all APS level classifications, with more men than women amongst EL and SES employees. For example, 70.1% of non-ongoing APS 1—2s are women, compared with only 17.3% of non-ongoing SES employees.

Figure 2.5: Proportion of total staff at each classification who are non-ongoing by sex, June 2004

Source: APSED

Use of labour hirees may also be a factor in the decline, though the magnitude of this cannot be quantified. There is some risk that the decline also represents in part some lessening of labour market flexibility in practice, including in response to union campaigns to transfer non-ongoing employees to ongoing status.

In general, small agencies have a greater proportion of their staff engaged as non-ongoing than do large agencies, with the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency (EOWA) (63.0%), the Australian Institute of Family Studies (AIFS) (50.6%) and the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS) (48.2%) having the greatest proportion of non-ongoing staff at June 2004.