Official Statistics

MOD civilian personnel sickness absence report: background quality report April 2022

Published 19 January 2023

1. Contact

Responsible statistician: Civilian Analysis Head of Branch

Further information/mailing list:

Analysis-Civilian-Enquiries@mod.gov.uk

2. Introduction & Statistical Presentation

Analysis Civilian produce a publication detailing ‘sickness absence’ for UK and Overseas civilian personnel employed by the Ministry of Defence (MOD). This is an annual publication published as an Official Statistic which can be found at MOD civilian sickness absence index page.

The report presents the latest sickness absences for the main budgetary areas of the MOD. It also provides a time-series of civilian sickness absences for the main categories of MOD employment, including the number of working days lost, the average number of working days lost, the number of occurrences of sickness absence, and the cause of sickness absence as defined by the World Health Organisation International Classification of Diseases (ICD).

This statistical output was first produced as an internal management information report to enable HR personnel and policy leads to better understand the effect of civilian sickness absence on MOD business. Following a consultation, it was decided to release this statistic within the public realm to enable a more transparent view of MOD civilian sickness absence.

The report was published on a quarterly basis until 2016 when after a consultation it moved to an annual basis.

3. Statistical Processing

3.1 Source Data

The data is sourced from Defence Business Service (DBS) who own the data on the MOD’s self-service Human Resources Management System (HRMS) administrative tool. As of March 2022 HRMS has been replaced by a new HR self-service system called MyHR. Additionally, data is also sourced from the Human Resources systems of the three Trading Funds.

MyHR populations include:

• MOD Main
• Defence Equipment & Support (DE&S)
• Submarine Delivery Agency (SDA)

Trading Fund Human Resources systems include:

• Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL)
• Defence Electronic Components Agency (DECA)
• UK Hydrographic Office (UKHO).

Once received, data are processed and stored on a centralised data base system and accessed by authorised users via a front-end user interface system.

As a result of the HRMS to MyHR transition, all key data elements and fields were transferred, but revisions to data reporting systems may lead to changes in comparative data between the two systems, and may not be fully comparable.

3.2 Data Collection Frequency

Administrative civilian personnel data is collected on a monthly basis, and civilian personnel absence data is collected on a quarterly basis.

3.3 Data collection

Civilian strength data is extracted monthly and is taken from MyHR on the first calendar day and made available to the production team within 10 working days. Civilian strength data relevant to this report includes Industrial and Non Industrial population splits as well as TLB markers. The validation and editing take around one week and production of the statistics and publications a further week.

Civilian absence data is extracted quarterly and is also taken from MyHR and Trading Funds and Executive Agencies’ data deliveries. The data collected covers all sickness absences up until the current quarter. Civilian absence data includes the cause of sickness absence (ICD), absence incidences and absence days lost. The validation for absence data is currently conducted alongside the publication process.

3.4 Data validation

Data validation is conducted as part of the acceptance of the quarterly extract, prior to it being made available to the production team through an absence data base front end tool. Unusual variations are identified and investigated to identify explanations/reasons for the changes. In instances where issues are identified, Analysis Civilian liaise with DBS to correct the data.

To ensure that errors are identified and resolved, a series of data quality checks are implemented throughout the validation process and the report’s production. Using tools such as R, SQL and Excel, the validation process focuses on matching figures across different statistical tools. Additionally, quality assurance processes have been automated in R to reduce human error. Finalised figures are then further validated by analysts across Analysis Civilian, focusing on the areas where problems with the data have been detected in the past.

4. Quality Management

4.1 Quality Assurance

The MOD’s quality management process for Official Statistics consists of three elements: (1) Regularly monitoring and assessing quality risk via an annual assessment; (2) Providing a mechanism for reporting and reviewing revisions/corrections to Official Statistics; (3) Ensuring BQRs are publishing alongside reports and are updated regularly.

4.2 Quality Assessment

During the internal Quality Risk Assessment process undertaken during 2022, this Official Statistic was assessed as being of medium risk. Since this assessment the two issues identified (Admin data source & Quality) have largely being resolved; the correct data delivery is now being received from MyHR and Trading Fund Human Resources systems, while a parallel R process has been created to enable the team to quality assure the figures in this report.

5. Relevance

The report was initially created to communicate civilian sickness absence figures to a wider range of internal and external users. Low viewing of the report suggest that external use of the publication is minimal, and as such Analysis Civilian is planning a public consultation to cease production of the report.

The Cabinet Office produces an Official Statistic which contains sickness absence figures for all Government Departments, including a MOD breakdown. Please see the Civil Service Sickness Absence Report.

6. Accuracy and Reliability

6.1 Overall Accuracy

The quality of the data is reliant on all episodes of sickness being reported on the human resource systems and the correct sickness code being chosen. Whilst it is mandated that all episodes of sickness are reported to the MOD, the recording is reliant upon employees and their managers entering all episodes of sickness onto the human resource systems and choosing the appropriate sickness code. Therefore, there is likely to be some under-reporting and incorrect categorisation which is not corrected for.

Policy is in place to help and guide staff on how to input staff sickness absence.

Defence Nuclear Organisation (DNO), under MOD Main Top Level Budget, and Submarine Delivery Agency (SDA), under Trading Funds and Executive Agencies, are two populations that are not separately identifiable on data provided for the purposes of producing Official Statistics on the MOD civilian workforce. Because the majority of the population from both organisations are classified as DNO on administrative data, these groups are reported within ‘Trading Funds and Executive Agencies’ as the Defence Nuclear Organisation, rather than as a MOD Main Top Level Budget.

6.2 Data Revisions

Data revisions are handled in accordance with Ministry of Defence revisions and corrections policy

In the 2021/22 report, the following revisions were made:

• Personnel not in receipt of pay (zero pay personnel) should be excluded from analysis in the Civilian Personnel Sickness Absence Annual Report. However, due to data quality issues some of these personnel have been included historically in the analysis.
• Due to low numbers of absence days lost within the Defence Electronic Components Agency (DECA) population, this population has historically been grouped with Head Office & Corporate Services (HO&Cs). Inconsistencies have been found in this methodology and have been revised accordingly.
• Due to undercounts in the sickness absence incidents and days lost, as a result of data base processing issue, in the period capturing sickness absences in the 12 Months Ending 31 March 2020, revisions have been made to previously published figures.
• Due to the same data base processing issues, minor revisions were also made in other periods. This had no significant impact on findings presented in previous reports. Revised figures have been represented with an [r] in data tables throughout this report. Analysis Civilian continue to monitor these data quality issues to ensure robust and accurate statistical processes are being followed.

7. Timeliness and Punctuality

7.1 Timeliness

The report for the previous financial year is released annually in June, within one month of the data being made available. The publication dates ensure data is available and at a suitable level of accuracy and allow sufficient time for processing and producing the report.

7.2 Punctuality

All official statistics reports have been published on time to meet preannounced release dates. A one-year release schedule outlining the following financial year’s publication date is published on the gov.uk Official Statistics Release Calendar. Future publication dates will also be announced on the UK Statistics Authority hub at least one month in advance.

This report was delivered late due to the HRMS to MyHR transition and the subsequent time required to ensure consistency and accuracy. This was for both the civilian personnel strength and absence data.

8. Coherence and Comparability

Below are the main limitations regarding the coherence and comparability of the Civilian Personnel Sickness Absence Report:

Please see the glossary within the main report to understand the structural definitions within the civilian workforce.

Structural changes have occurred during the time-series covered by MOD civilian personnel statistics. In some cases, this means that figures are not directly comparable across the whole period. To aid understanding of these changes and how they have impacted upon the figures the detail of these changes is provided here:

• As at 1 April 2020 650, posts in Head Office & Corporate Services (HO&Cs) covering security vetting in Defence Business Services UKSV were privatised.
• As at 1 April 2018 approximately 1,160 posts transferred out of DE&S Trading Entity to form Defence Nuclear Organisation (DNO) as an Executive Agency, additionally approximately 80 personnel within DG Nuclear also transferred to DNO.
• According to MOD administrative data systems, 2,400 people are classified as being within the Defence Nuclear Organisation (DNO). As at April 2022 approximately 1950 of that population work within the Submarine Delivery Agency (SDA), an Executive Agency of the Ministry of Defence and not form part of MOD Main. Approximately 450 personnel work within the Defence Nuclear Organisation (DNO), a TLB within MOD Main. The two populations are not separately identifiable on data provided for the purposes of producing Official Statistics on the MOD civilian workforce. Because the majority of the population classified as DNO on administrative data work for the Submarine Delivery Agency (SDA), an Executive Agency, this group is reported within ‘Trading Funds and Executive agencies’ as the Defence Nuclear Organisation, rather than as a MOD Main Top Level Budget.

9. Accessibility and Clarity

All reports are published on the Defence Gov.uk website. Publications are available from 0930 hours on the day of release. 24-hour pre-release access to the report is available to a limited distribution list within the MOD. The full list can be found in the pre-release access list.

The Civilian Personnel Sickness Absence Annual Report is available in HTML format. The report includes the following sections:

• Main Points
• Symbols and Conventions
• Rounding
• Revisions
• Glossary

The report contains commentary to highlight summary statistics and the main changes that have impacted the statistics and a glossary to explain categories and definitions used. Graphics are used to present time-series and quarter-on-quarter changes. Data tables for each report are separately available in an Excel ODS format. Each table has notes clarifying explanations of key terminology and footnotes.

10. Trade offs between output quality components

The trade-off between timeliness and accuracy/depth of analysis has ensured that the information is made available as soon as possible after the end of the reporting period.

11. Confidentiality and Security

11.1 Confidentiality – Policy

All staff involved in the production process have undertaken the necessary Data Protection Act training and all MOD, Civil Service and data protection regulations are adhered to.

11.2 Confidentiality – Data Treatment

All published outputs are counts of individuals in particular groupings. Disclosure control is applied to statistical or numeric information to safeguard the confidentiality of individuals. ‘Disclosure control’ refers to the efforts made to reduce the risk of disclosure, such as applying statistical methods to protect ‘personally identifiable information’ (PII) in aggregate data tables. These safeguards can take many forms (e.g. data suppression, rounding, recoding etc.).

Where issues of sensitivity occur within the data, [z] is used to represent counts lower than 5 or 10 as needed to ensure anonymity, this suppression is also applied to any related derived values or proportions.

An updated MOD Disclosure Control and Rounding policy has been published on GOV.UK and we have applied this policy to the statistics on Civilian personnel in the accompanying Excel tables. The policy is available here.

11.3 Security

The data is stored, accessed and analysed using the MOD’s restricted network and IT systems, and the access to raw data is password protected.