Access to justice
Latest update: 06 February 2024
The proportion of adults who are confident that the Scottish Criminal Justice System, as a whole, makes sure everyone has access to the justice system if they need it. Find out more about this indicator.
The proportion of adults who were confident that the Scottish Justice System makes sure everyone has access to the Justice System if they need it was 74% in 2021/22, unchanged since 2019/20 (75%) and increased since 2008/09 (70%).
Data Breakdowns
This indicator can be broken down by age, gender, disability, Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation, and urban/rural location in the drop down menus below the charts.
For victim status, no difference was found by victim/non-victim of SCJS crime in the confidence that the Scottish Justice System makes sure everyone has access to the Justice System if they need it in 2021/22.This breakdown can be viewed on the Equality Evidence Finder.
Performance Maintaining
Confidence that the Scottish Justice System makes sure everyone has access to the Justice System if they need it was highest for 45-59 year olds (72%).
Confidence that the Scottish Justice System makes sure everyone has access to the Justice System if they need it was higher for males (76%) than females (72%).
Confidence that the Scottish Justice System makes sure everyone has access to the Justice System if they need it was lower for adults who had a disability than for those who did not have a disability (71% compared to 75%).
Confidence that the Scottish Justice System makes sure everyone has access to the Justice System if they need it did not vary by deprivation.
Confidence that the Scottish Justice System makes sure everyone has access to the Justice System if they need it did not vary by urban/rural location in 2021/22.
Influence over local decisions
Latest update: 08 May 2024
Percentage of people who agree with the statement "I can influence decisions affecting my local area". Find out more about this indicator.
In 2022, 17.8% of people agreed that they can influence decisions affecting their local area. There is no change from 2019, however this continues to be the lowest level since first measured in 2007.
Data breakdowns
This indicator can be broken down by age, ethnicity, gender, disability, Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation and urban/rural classification. These breakdowns can be viewed in the drop down menus below or on the Equality Evidence Finder.
Breakdowns are also available by local authority which can be found on the Equality Evidence Finder and are noted below:
- Adults living in Shetland Islands (30%), Orkney Islands (30%), and East Lothian (29%) reported a high level of agreement with the statement ‘I can influence decisions affecting my local area’.
- In comparison, the lowest levels of agreement with the statement were reported by adults living in South Ayrshire (11%), Angus (9%), and Na h-Eileanan Siar (9%).
- The average level of agreement across all local authorities in Scotland is 18%.
Important information
Data for this indicator is available for 2020 and 2021. However, please note that the results are not directly comparable to results for previous years. Data for 2020 and 2021, and further information can be viewed here.
Performance Maintaining
The youngest and oldest respondents felt similarly about their ability to influence decisions in their local area (19% of respondents aged 16 to 24 and 17% of respondents aged 75 and over).
Men and women felt similarly about the statement that they can influence decisions in their local area (19% of men agreed and 17% of women agreed).
Respondents with a disability felt less able to influence decisions in their local area (15%) compared to respondents without a disability (19%).
White and Other minority ethnic respondents felt similarly about their ability to influence decisions in their local area (18% of White respondents and 20% of Other minority ethnic respondents).
30% of adults recorded as ‘Another Religion’, 26% of ‘Other Christians’, 24% of ‘Church of Scotland’, 22% of ‘Roman Catholics’ and 22% of those who say ‘ None’ felt lonely ‘some, most, almost all, or all of the time’ in the last week.
Adults in the 20% most deprived areas, as measured by SIMD, reported feeling less able to influence decisions in their local area (14% of adults) compared to adults in the 20% least deprived areas (19% of adults).
People living in Urban areas were a little less likely than adults living in Rural areas to agree with the statement that they can influence decisions in their local area (17% compared to 21%).
Quality of public services
Latest update: 08 May 2024
Percentage of respondents who are fairly or very satisfied with the quality of local services (local health services, local schools and public transport). Find out more about this indicator.
The percentage of adults satisfied with local health services, local schools and public transport in 2022 was 39.5%, representing a decrease of 13.1 percentage points in satisfaction compared to the previous data year of 2019. This is also the lowest level in satisfaction since this was first measured in 2007.
The large decrease in the combined indicator was mainly driven by significant decreases in satisfaction for each of the individual services.
Satisfaction with local health services went from 79.7% in 2019 to 63.7% in 2022 (a decrease of 16 percentage points) and public transport went from 67.8% in 2019 to 57.8% in 2022 (a decrease of 10 percentage points). There was a smaller decrease in the satisfaction in local schools from 73.2% in 2019 to 69.3% in 2022 (a decrease of 3.9 percentage points).
Data breakdowns
This indicator can be broken down by age, gender, ethnicity, disability, Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation and urban/rural classification. These can be viewed as charts in the drop down menus below and on the Equality Evidence Finder.
Breakdowns are also available for local authority which can be viewed on the Equality Evidence Finder and is noted below:
- The local authorities that reported the highest level of satisfaction with the quality of public services were Edinburgh (61%) and West Dunbartonshire (56%). In comparison, the local authorities with the lowest levels of satisfaction were Renfrewshire (26%) and Dumfries & Galloway (28%). The average level of satisfaction across all local authorities in Scotland was 40%.
Important information
Data for this indicator is available for 2020 and 2021. However, please note that the 2020 results are not directly comparable to results for previous years. Data for 2020 and 2021, and further information can be viewed here.
Performance Worsening
People aged 75+ had similar levels of satisfaction with public services (41%) compared to those aged 16-24 (39%).
Men (41%) and women (39%) had similar levels of satisfaction with public services.
In 2022, adults with a disability expressed lower levels of satisfaction with public services (35%) compared to adults without a disability (41%).
People from a White ethnic group had a lower level of satisfaction with public services (39%) compared to people from a minority ethnic group (53%).
There were similar levels of satisfaction with public services across adults that belonged to no religion and adults that belonged to the Church of Scotland, Roman Catholic and Other Christian.
However, adults identified as belonging to Another religion were most satisfied with public services (health services, schools, and public transport) (49% were satisfied).
Satisfaction with the quality of public services (local health services, schools and public transport combined) varied by the level of deprivation, as measured by SIMD.
Satisfaction was higher in the 20% least deprived areas (44% of adults) compared to the 20% most deprived areas (38% of adults).
People living in Urban areas were more satisfied with all three public services (health, schools, public transport) compared to people living in Rural areas (40% of adults in Urban areas compared to 36% in Rural areas).
Trust in public organisations
Latest update: January 2024
The 2020 Scottish Household Survey asked adult respondents to what extent they trust seven Scottish public institutions.
All of the institutions included in the question were trusted by the majority of respondents.
Although we cannot use the 2020 data to create the baseline for the NPF indicator, the SHS findings are presented here for information.
Respondents were most likely to say that they trusted the Health System: 93% of adults trusted it while just 6% distrusted it.
In 2020, 74% of adults said that they trusted the Scottish Government, while 21% said that they distrusted it.
Respondents were least likely to say that they trusted the Civil Service (67%) or Local Government (67%).
Important information
Care must be taken when making comparisons between institutions because the percentage of adults saying they don’t know or are not sure if they trust each institution varies widely. For example, 21% of respondents said that they didn’t know whether or not they trusted the Civil Service, compared with only 1% of adults for the Health System.
This indicator is in development which means we do not yet have all data to report for this indicator.
We will publish data on this indicator as soon as it becomes available.
Performance to be confirmed