Statistics on MPs' staff

I can confirm that we hold some information relevant to your request which is provided in the spreadsheet.

IPSA does not hold the length of service data for each year or the median length of service figures. These have been calculated specifically for this response.

Notes on the data

• As each MP is a separate employer, the data is not a true indication of the median length of service as statistics include personnel:

  • who left the service of one MP, but continued in the role for another MP: these could show as a leaver and as a starter

  • who was promoted to a different role

  • working for more than one MP who could have been recorded more than once on the system

• There are inconsistencies in data for 2010/11, the first year of IPSA's operation. Figures have been skewed by data migrated from different legacy systems and the staff changes following the May 2010 general election. For example, 25 staff had starting dates after their official leaving date, possibly in order to set them up on the system so that redundancy payments could be made to staff working for non-returning or stepping down MPs.

• For the purposes of calculating median service, staff who were employed at the end of the financial year were given an end date of 31 March so that the length of their service to the end of that year could be taken into account.