Sharon Hodgson – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for International Development

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Sharon Hodgson on 2014-06-10.

To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what targets her Department has for increasing diversity; and what progress has been made on meeting those targets in the last year.

Mr Alan Duncan

DFID has aligned with the Civil Service-wide diversity targets for levels of representation in the Senior Civil Service (SCS). These targets are:

· 39% of the SCS to be women – DFID has achieved this target as 39% of our SCS are women.

· 34% of top management posts (Director and above) to be held by women DFID has exceeded this target as 42% of such posts are held by women.

· 5% of the Senior Civil Service to be minority ethnic staff – DFID has exceeded this target as 7% of our SCS are minority ethnic.

· 5% of the Senior Civil Service to be disabled people – DFID has exceeded this target as 6% of our SCS identify as having a disability.

In addition to this DFID has made a commitment to improve staff engagement survey scores for people with disabilities as this is recognised as an issue across government. DFID has improved the overall staff engagement survey score for staff with disabilities from 65% in November 2012 to 71% in November 2013.