GLASGOW has seen the largest increase of social carers with almost 28,000 people working in the industry throughout the city.

A survey conducted by the Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC) has revealed that between December 2018 and December 2019 the Glasgow City area saw the biggest “absolute” rise with 27,770 working in the social services division.

It was discovered that 9640 people worked in the public sector, 7750 in the private sector and 10,380 were volunteers.

Glasgow and Edinburgh had the largest workforces making just over 23 per cent of the Scottish workforce.

The SSSC report which highlights the size and importance of the workforce also shows that more people than ever before work in Scotland’s social services and they have played a vital role during the Covid-19 pandemic.

There are at least 206,400 people in the workforce, which makes up approximately 7.8 per cent of all Scottish employment or one in 13 jobs.

The report combines administrative data collected by the Care Inspectorate with information gathered by the SSSC directly from local authorities to form a comprehensive picture of the paid workforce employed in the social service sector in Scotland at the end of 2019

Lorraine Gray, SSSC Chief Executive said: “The challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic have brought Scotland’s social service workers to the fore and this report shows the size and breadth of the sector.

“They play a vital role in protecting and supporting some of society’s most vulnerable citizens and represent one in 13 of all employment in Scotland, so make a significant contribution to the economy too.

“As well as being skilled and qualified roles, people must also bring the right values and we can see from the report that this is a committed workforce with just over three quarters in the same post as the previous year.

“One of the largest increases this year was in the day care of children sub-sector, with an extra 2,360 workers, as recruitment continues towards the expansion of free early learning and childcare. Although COVID-19 has delayed this deadline we expect increased recruitment to day care of children’s service to continue.”

For more information or to view the report visit the SSSC website at https://data.sssc.uk.com/component/ssscvisualisations