Over one fifth of the film production workforce is aged 50 or over and very few are under 24 years.  This industry is relatively mature compared with other audio visual industries.

Only 33% of the production workforce is female and 5% of the workforce are people from ethnic minority groups.  The representation of women and ethnic minorities varies greatly by occupation which is significant as the production industry is largely based in London where 38% of the people of working age are from an ethnic minority.

2% of the workforce are reported to have a disability.

One fifth of the film production workforce are aged 50 years or older compared to 3% aged under 25 years of age.  Men in the film production workforce are older than women.  Women are more likely to be between 25-34 years of age compared to men (41% women, 26% men).

Women in the film workforce have lower audio visual incomes than men: 35% of women earn less than £20,000 compared with 18% of men.

Source: Skillset 2005a and Skillset 2005c

The TV workforce is young with over half the workforce in terrestrial TV and two thirds of the workforce in cable and satellite and independent production under 35 years. There are far more people wanting to enter the industry than there are jobs in it which can lead to young people being prepared to work long hours for low pay

Whilst employment of ethnic minorities in broadcast TV has risen from 6.5% in 2000 to 9% in 2004, overall the industry employs a low proportion of people from ethnic minorities relative to the general population in its main geographic centres.  The audio visual industries as a whole employs 7% people from ethnic minority groups, compared to 8% across the whole UK workforce.  This is also the case for 35% of the population of working age in inner London, which is where more than half the industry is based.  There is a particularly low representation of people from ethnic minorities in the cable and satellite (5%) and independent production industries (5%). 

There are major differences in the representation of women by occupational group. 50% of the broadcast TV work force is female compared to 57% in cable and satellite and 43% in independent production. 

People with disabilities are generally under-represented in the total TV industry workforce.

Source: Skillset 2005a

27% of the interactive media workforce is female, compared with 38% across the audio visual industries as a whole.  Employment of women in the electronic games industry is especially low at 8%.

Around 7% of the interactive media workforce is classified as from an ethnic minority group, compared with 7% of the wider audio visual workforce.  Throughout the whole of Great Britain, 11% of the population of working age are ethnic minorities, but this rises to 38% in London, where much of the workforce is based.  The proportion of people from ethnic minority groups working in electronic games is substantially lower than the 3% average.

16% of the workforce are working on a freelance basis.

1% of the interactive media workforce are disabled.

Source: Skillset website 2005

• 22,200 people work in broadcast radio which is 14% of the media sector
• 23% are freelance
• 48% are women
• 7.6% are from ethnic minorities
• 1.6% are disabled

Source: Skillset 2005b

The animation industry in the UK employs an estimated 3,000 people, of which:

• 47% work on a freelance basis
• 44% are women (58% are employees and 28% are freelancers)
• 7.2% are from minority ethnic groups (4.8% are employees and 10.1% are freelancers)
• 1.6% are disabled (0.7% are employees and 2.7% are freelancers)

Source: skillset 2005b

The photo imaging industry in the UK employs an estimated 142,000 people.

29% of the workforce are under 30 years of age.

Source: skillset 2004b

Note: There is limited information on the photo imaging workforce as this is new to Skillset's remit.  More data will be available in the future.

The performers workforce is 49% male and 51% female.  The proportion of females working in the industry is higher than the proportion working in the UK economy as a whole (46%) and higher than the audio visual industries as whole (39%).

Age profile of the workforce:

• 8% are aged 16-24 years
• 24% 25-34 years
• 32% 35-49 years
• 33% are aged 50 years and over

Across the whole economy 64% of the workforce are aged 35 years and over, a similar percentage to the performers workforce (65%).

One in ten performers have a disability, compared to 5% across the whole economy (defined by the Disability Discrimination Act).

6% of the performers worked classified themselves as belonging to a minority ethnic group.

Source: Skillset 2005f