ALB, Arm’s Length Bodies, Public Bodies, Quangos, Public Servants, Civil Servants
In 2023/24 ALBs employed
397,256 FTE
The ALB workforce has increased by 2%
390,850 in 2022/23
HM Prison and Probation Service employed
64,920 FTE
and are the largest ALB employer.
The majority of all ALB staff are civil servants
246,224 FTE (62%)
Cabinet Office | ALB Landscape Analysis 2023-24
For the 2023/24 Financial Year, the Cabinet Office did not collect data on the number of London-based staff employed by ALBs. However this data was previously collected in the 2022/23 Financial Year publication, when London-based staff made up around 14% of the entire ALB workforce. More information on the UK government’s strategy for relocating government roles can be found in Places for Growth.
On the 31st of March 2024, there were 397,256 Full-Time Equivalents (FTE) employed by Arm’s Length Bodies.
Civil Servants: Of this total, 62% of staff employed in these organisations were civil servants (246,224 FTE). Within the ALB landscape, civil servants work primarily within Non-Ministerial Departments and Executive Agencies.
Public Servants: Public servants made up 37.9% of the workforce (150,720 FTE), and are primarily employed by Executive Non-Departmental Public Bodies.
Shared Workforces: A tiny proportion of around 0.1% of the workforce were employed in Advisory and Tribunal NDPBs, where staff may be either civil or public servants (around 312 FTE). Staff employed in these organisations are often employed on a part-time basis, and may spend part of their time working for other ALBs or their sponsoring departments.
Cabinet Office | ALB Landscape Analysis 2023-24
Cabinet Office | ALB Landscape Analysis 2023-24
As of the 31st March 2024 there were 510,125 FTE staff employed in the UK Civil Service, as captured by the Annual Civil Service Employment Survey (ACSES). Within this total, around 228,030 FTE were employed within the UK government’s ministerial departments, around 32,620 FTE within devolved governments, and a further 6,365 FTE employed within other UK Civil Service organisations.
Staff employed by Executive Agencies and Non-Ministerial Departments are typically captured within both ACSES and the ALB Landscape publications. Organisations with these classifications collectively accounted for 242,019 FTE within the ALB Landscape. However, there are a few differences in the scope of these publications, as ACSES does not capture staff employed within the Forestry Commission (Non-Ministerial Department) and their Executive Agency, Forest Research. These organisations are ALBs sponsored by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, and have classifications which mean their staff are civil servants, collectively employing 1,355 FTE. However, Forestry Commission are legislatively distinct from the UK domestic Civil Service, and therefore these ALBs do not appear within the ACSES publication.
The main distinction between the workforces captured by ACSES and the ALB Landscape Analysis is the NDPB workforce, who typically employ public servants, and are out of scope for ACSES. Across 194 NDPBs there were 155,236 FTE staff employed in 2023/24.
Direct comparisons with the Annual Civil Service Employment Survey (ACSES) should be interpreted with caution, as the ACSES publication reports all staff for each organisation rounded to the nearest 5. In contrast, the ALB Landscape Analysis typically reports these figures unrounded, which may result in differences between their aggregated totals.
Cabinet Office | ALB Landscape Analysis 2023-24
Cabinet Office | ALB Landscape Analysis 2023-24
While ALBs collectively employed around 397,256 FTE, the vast majority of these (271,230) were employed in ALBs sponsored by just 5 departments, representing 68.2% of the total workforce. The departments sponsoring the largest ALB workforces were: Ministry of Justice (85,575), Department for Transport (66,311), HM Revenue and Customs (64,874). As a Non-Ministerial department, HMRC operates as its own sponsor, whilst also sponsoring the Valuation Office Agency.
Circles represent FTE for individual ALBs, bars represent total FTE for ALBs under sponsor.
Cabinet Office | ALB Landscape Analysis 2023-24
ALBs provide many different types of public services, yet the majority of staff employed by ALBs (FTE) work in the following types of bodies: Major programmes and delivery organisation (272,719), Safety, licensing and regulation body (36,604), Grant and subsidy issuing body (25,620). Collectively, these types of bodies employed 334,943 staff, representing 84.3% of the total ALB workforce (397,256) in 2023/24. Many of these ALBs, such as HMRC and Network Rail, deliver public-facing front-line services, requiring larger workforces than other ALBs.
Circles represent FTE for individual ALBs, bars represent total FTE for ALBs by purpose group.
Cabinet Office | ALB Landscape Analysis 2023-24
In 2023/24 306 ALBs collectively employed 397,256 FTE. The 10 ALBs with the largest workforces employed 243,978 FTE, representing 61.4% of the total workforce. Many of these ALBs deliver vital front-line public services, requiring large workforces.
For example:
HMPPS (64,920 FTE) employ 62,465 staff (FTE) in Operational Delivery profession roles, who were responsible for their population of 87,869 prisoners in 2023/24.
HMRC (61,185 FTE) employ 27,335 FTE in Operational Delivery profession roles and 14,530 FTE in Tax-based profession roles, which helped HMRC to collect £843.4bn in tax revenues during 2023/24.
Network Rail have a total workforce of 40,026 FTE, who helped Network Rail provide 60.1 billion kilometres in passenger journeys whilst also supporting 15.8 billion net tonne kilometres of freight transport throughout 2023/24.
Cabinet Office | ALB Landscape Analysis 2023-24
The total ALB workforce has increased from 390,850 in 2022/23 to 397,256 in 2023/24.
The largest changes in ALB workforce sizes for 2023/24 were seen in the staff employed by HMPPS, who increased by 2,701 FTE (4.3%), and HMRC, who decreased by -2,553 FTE (-4%), relative to 2022/23. These changes reflect the large overall size of workforces employed by both ALBs, and these changes only represent a small proportion of their total workforce.
When examining proportional differences in ALB workforces, the largest changes are seen in Advanced Research and Invention Agency (ARIA) and UK Infrastructure Bank (UKIB). The workforce of ARIA increased by 260% (+26 FTE), whilst UKIB increased by 194.8% (+141 FTE), relative to 2022/23. Both of these bodies are relatively new and had relatively small workforces in 2022/23, and as such would be expected to grow in size as they become fully operational.
Only includes data for ALBs with a workforce greater than 10 FTE.
Excludes newly established/classified ALBs for this financial year.
Cabinet Office | ALB Landscape Analysis 2023-24
Only includes data for ALBs with a workforce greater than 10 FTE.
Excludes newly established/classified ALBs for this financial year.
Cabinet Office | ALB Landscape Analysis 2023-24
Cabinet Office | ALB Landscape Analysis 2023-24
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