Chapter 2: Statistical snapshot
The past decade has seen considerable change in the structure of the APS. A period of restructure and reduction in size has been followed by some growth. In addition to this, there have been changes in the profile of the APS, with fewer jobs at lower levels, an ageing workforce and an increasing proportion of women. These trends have been evident for some years and, based on the latest data available, are likely to continue.
This chapter explores current demographic and labour force patterns of people employed under the Act. The main source of data is APSED, maintained by the Commission.1 APSED contains information about recruitment, mobility and separations for all ongoing and non-ongoing employees. Further detail on the size and composition of the APS can be found in the Australian Public Service Statistical Bulletin 2004–05.2
1 While every effort is made to ensure the integrity of APSED data, the Commission cannot be held responsible for inaccuracies in the data provided by agencies. The Commission undertakes extensive audits of the data, and as a result of these audits, some errors in historical data have been corrected. For this reason, caution should be exercised when comparing data presented in this report with that from earlier years. Most significantly, previously published data on employee numbers may have been revised and therefore may not be directly comparable. Due to different data sources and definitions, there may be variations between the data published here and that published by individual agencies.
2 Conceptual definitions used in workforce analysis are set out in the Introduction and Explanatory Notes to the Australian Public Service Statistical Bulletin 2004–05.
