Using the 870-$mu$m APEX Telescope Large Area Survey of the Galaxy (ATLASGAL), we have identified 577 submillimetre continuum sources with masers from the methanol multibeam (MMB) survey in the region $280degr < ell < 20degr$; $|,b,| < 1.5degr$. 94,per,cent of methanol masers in the region are associated with sub-millimetre dust emission. We estimate masses for ~450 maser-associated sources and find that methanol masers are preferentially associated with massive clumps. These clumps are centrally condensed, with envelope structures that appear to be scale-free, the mean maser position being offset from the peak column density by 0.0 pm 4. Assuming a Kroupa initial mass function and a star-formation efficiency of ~30,per,cent, we find that over two thirds of the clumps are likely to form clusters with masses >20,msun. Furthermore, almost all clumps satisfy the empirical mass-size criterion for massive star formation. Bolometric luminosities taken from the literature for ~100 clumps range between ~100 and 10$^6$,lsun. This confirms the link between methanol masers and massive young stars for 90,per,cent of our sample. The Galactic distribution of sources suggests that the star-formation efficiency is significantly reduced in the Galactic-centre region, compared to the rest of the survey area, where it is broadly constant, and shows a significant drop in the massive star-formation rate density in the outer Galaxy. We find no enhancement in source counts towards the southern Scutum-Centaurus arm tangent at $ell ~ 315degr$, which suggests that this arm is not actively forming stars.
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