Workforce profile

Ongoing and non-ongoing employees

The growth in overall employee numbers during 2006–07 reflected growth in both the ongoing and non-ongoing employment categories.

Ongoing employees

At June 2007, there were 143,525 ongoing employees in the APS, an increase of 8,723 or 6.5% on the previous year (unadjusted for coverage changes). This growth continued the trend that has been evident for the past eight years.

The largest increases in ongoing employee numbers were in Defence (up by 1,503 or 8.1%), Centrelink (1,246 or 4.9%), DHS (744 or 14.1%), DIAC (642 or 11.1%), Medicare Australia (587 or 11.5%) and FaCSIA (421 or 18.4%). Smaller agencies with large proportional increases were AUSTRAC (109 or 84.5%), the CrimTrac Agency (28 or 52.8%), the Office of the Australian Building and Construction Commissioner (40 or 50.6%) and ComSuper (131 or 39.7%). The largest decreases in ongoing employment occurred in ATO (down by 187 or 0.9%) and DVA (78 or 3.4%).

Non-ongoing employees

Non-ongoing employee numbers also rose this year, up from 11,432 at June 2006 to 11,957 at June 2007—an increase of 4.6%. However, this was a slight fall in proportional terms—at 30 June 2007, non-ongoing employees accounted for 7.7% of total employment, down slightly from 7.8% last year. This was the first year since 2003–04 that growth in non- ongoing employment was proportionally lower than that for ongoing employees, but as the longer-term trend since 1992–93 has been downwards, this may reflect a stabilising of non-ongoing proportional representation.

There were large shifts in the use of non-ongoing employees in agencies this year. The variation in the numbers in individual agencies suggests that non-ongoing employment is being used flexibly to deal with peaks and troughs in work demands. Agencies with the largest increase in non-ongoing employee numbers were ATO (up by 740 or 71.6% on the number at June 2006), Health (up by 154 or 25.5%) and DHS (up by 149 or 56.7%). Agencies with the largest decline in non-ongoing employment were Centrelink (down by 505 or 43.0%), ABS (309 or 64.4%), DIAC (199 or 35.4%) and DEWR (139 or 42.9%).

Figure 2.3 shows how non-ongoing employment as a proportion of total employment has varied over the past fifteen years.

Figure 2.3: Non-ongoing employees as a proportion of total employees, 1993 to 2007

Chart: description available below

Figure 2.3 shows non-ongoing employees as a proportion of total employees, from 1993 to 2007. Over the period, the proportion has fallen, although it has plateaued in the past three years. Women represent a higher proportion of non-ongoing employment than do men.

Source: APSED

Non-ongoing employees can be engaged in three different categories: specified term, specified task, or for duties that are irregular or intermittent. At June 2007, the majority (80.1%) were engaged for a specified term, 5.6% for a specified task and 14.3% for irregular or intermittent duties.

Non-ongoing employees have historically been concentrated at lower classification levels—at June 2007, 64.8% of non-ongoing employees were at the APS 1–4 levels compared with 39.8% of ongoing employees. Almost one-third of all APS 1–2 employees are non-ongoing. It is likely that some of these employees are in trainee-type positions, but are not employed in the trainee classifications.

The representation of non-ongoing employees is much lower at higher classifications—only 4.1% of EL employees are non-ongoing. The proportion of non-ongoing employment is, however, higher for SES Band 3 (9.8%) and Band 2 (8.3%) than for Band 1 (3.6%) employees. This may reflect agencies’ use of senior people with significant private sector experience for specific, short-term projects. The general concentration of non-ongoing employees at lower levels, while still strong, has fallen over time.

The age profile of non-ongoing employees has two peaks—in the 20–29 age group and a second, smaller peak in the 55–59 age group—with many of this latter group having had previous experience as ongoing APS employees, and presumably returning on a non-ongoing basis after CSS-induced ‘retirement’. Re-engagement and prior service for ongoing employees is discussed in detail later in this chapter. Over one-third of non-ongoing employees (36.5%) are aged under 30, compared with only 16.5% of ongoing employees. Similarly, 15.7% of non-ongoing employees are aged 55 or over compared with only 11.2% of ongoing employees.

The agencies with the largest number of non-ongoing employees at June 2007 were ATO (1,773 or 7.7% of total employees), Defence (1,047 or 4.9%), Health (759 or 15.7%) and Centrelink (670 or 2.5%).

In general, smaller agencies engage a higher proportion of their employees on a non-ongoing basis than do large agencies. Of the 25 agencies with more than 20% of their employees engaged on a non-ongoing basis, all had fewer than 250 ongoing employees except for PM&C, ComSuper, AHL and the Federal Court. The agencies with the highest proportion of non-ongoing employees were Questacon (67.5% non-ongoing) and AIATSIS (56.1%).