News

Administrative data is updated and made available by organisations and government departments for research purposes at different points throughout the year. The ADLS will announce the release of when these datasets are available via Twitter.

If you would like to receive this information please follow ADLS here.  If you do not already have a Twitter account to do this, you can sign up here.  Registration is free and only takes a minute or two and you can receive tweets on your PC and mobile devices. You can also receive our regular administrative data news items via email by registering with us here.

The Higher Education Statistics Agency collect a wide variety of information about publicly funded higher education in the UK. The Estates Management Statistics collection can be used to look at a wide variety of green, energy and efficiency related performance issues across higher education institutions. Data collected includes details on environmental staff, numbers of buildings and sites, teaching space and occupancy rate, functional stability and student bed spaces.

Full information including access procedures for research is available from here.

The Scottish Government is working with a wide range of partners to establish a collaborative framework that will facilitate data linkages for research and statistical purposes to be conducted safely, securely, legally, ethically and efficiently.  The foundation of the framework will be a set of principles which provide common standards for safe and effective data linkage and which will underpin a robust governance mechanism that reflects and promotes the core values in play.

Some of the aims of the framework are to:

(i) Enable better use of existing data and administrative data to develop efficient and reliable methods of producing demographic and census-type statistics.
(ii) Allow relatively low cost longitudinal research to be conducted both retrospectively and prospectively, informing preventative spend.
(iii) Provide exemplars of research excellence, enhancing Scotland’s reputation and attracting investment and job creation to Scotland.

The Scottish Government are now inviting your views on the aims and guiding principles of the Data Linkage Framework.  You can find out more on the framework and how to contribute by downloading the consultation paper from here.

The HMRC Datalab allows access to anonymised HM Revenue & Customs data for approved academic researchers in a secure environment.  The Datalab has recently added new datasets and produced a catalogue of their datasets that could be made available for research use. 

The Data Catalogue details the different types of administrative data held by the HMRC that could be made available for research in the Datalab.  Examples include Child Benefit, Trust Funds and Childcare data, Inheritance Tax, Tobacco duties, UK Border Agency and Overseas Trade.

For further information on the datasets held in the HMRC Datalab and to download the Data Catalogue visit their web page here.

The National Centre for Research Methods (NCRM) is pleased to announce that the bookings for the 5^th ESRC Research Methods Festival (2-5 July 2012 at St Catherine’s College, Oxford, UK) are now open. 

The festival is the biggest social science research methods event of the year in the UK, with over 60 sessions, 200 presenters and 800 delegates over the four days. This biennial Festival aims to engage social scientists across a wide range of disciplines and sectors and at different points in their research careers, by stimulating interest, raising issues, highlighting opportunities and showcasing new developments.  The Festival offers over 60 sessions from introductory to advanced level, PhD student poster exhibition, inspiring keynote talks, and an exciting social programme for evenings.

The themes of the festival are:

• The interface between social and natural sciences
• Methodological innovations
• Mixed and multimodal methods
• Career and skills development
• Interventions and evaluations

Dates and venue: Monday 2nd July – Thursday 5th July 2012 at St Catherine’s College, Oxford.
Early bird fees: Students £5 on Mon 2 July, £20 per day on Tue 3 – Thu 5 July, when booked before 16 April.  Others £12 on Mon 2 July, £25 per day on Tue 3 – Thu 5 July, when booked before 16 April.
Further information: More details about the Festival programme and bookings is available from the Festival website here. 

Medical Research Centre, London.  Friday 27^th April 2012.

The ADLS will be running the ESRC Safe Researcher training course again this year. The course has been updated and will be of particular use and benefit to researchers and other parties who are interested in understanding and using administrative data for research.  The course covers: 

1. An introduction to administrative data in the UK.
2. Responsibilities of a researcher (legal guidance).
3. Creating safe settings and data security.
4. Good practice in the analysis of administrative datasets.
5. Understanding statistical disclosure and avoiding disclosive outputs.
6. Guidance to make administrative data applications.

The course has been endorsed by the Information Commissioner’s Office and the major administrative data holding government departments in the UK.

The cost is subsidised by the ESRC and costs £45 including lunch.  Some funding maybe available for travel costs for students or the unwaged who might otherwise be unable to attend. 

There are only 24 places available so if you wished to attend it would be advisable to book sooner rather than later based on demand for previous courses.  Further information and booking details are available to download from here.

The Cathie Marsh Centre for Census and Survey Research are running the following data linkage courses:

Linking Data: An introduction.
The one day course will introduce basic concepts of data linkage, provide background information on data linkage applications and different data sources as well as aspects of preparing datasets for data linkage. By the end of the day, participants should have an understanding of what is involved when merging datasets.

Date: Wednesday 21st March 2012.
Time: 0930 – 1630.
Cost: £175 (£125 from educational institutions).

Linking Data: Theory to Practice.
The two-day course will be a continuation of the background course taught on day one for those interested in implementing data linkage techniques and will include methodological and statistical aspects of this new emerging area. The course will cover probabilistic approaches to data linkage including pre-matching processes, string comparators, determining field weights, types of errors and decision theory, the evaluation of the quality of linkage procedures and the analysis of linked datasets. By the end of the course, participants should be able to implement and evaluate data linkage procedures. The course will have a strong practical emphasis to enable course participants to put the taught methods into practice and will include a tutorial and computer workshop.

Date: Thursday 22nd March – Friday 23rd March 2012.
Time: 0930 – 1630.
Cost £350 (£250 from educational institutions).

Further information on these courses is available from here.

Road accidents on the public highway in Great Britain, reported to the police and which involve human injury or death, are recorded by police officers onto a STATS19 report form. The form collects a wide variety of information about the accident (such as time, date, location, road conditions) together with the vehicles and casualties involved and contributory factors to the accident (as interpreted by the police).  The form is completed at either the scene of the accident, or when the accident is reported to the police.

STATS19 data are analysed nationally and forms the basis for annual statistics on road accidents and casualties which are published by the Department for Transport, and the Scottish and Welsh Governments. The results are used extensively for research work and for guidance in the improvement of road safety in relation to roads, road users, vehicles and traffic movement.

Full information on this dataset, including the various ways that the STATS19 data can be accessed is available from here.

Citizens Advice is the national organisation for the Citizens Advice Bureaux in England and Wales.  The service helps approximately 2.1 million clients a year with around 7 million problems.

Each Bureau collects  a wide range of information about their clients including their profile (covering age, gender, ethnicity, disability and location of the client), the broad issue that the client seeks advice on (such as benefit, debt), the detail of the problem (such as the type of debt or benefit) and a third category which describes the nature of the advice given.  Also recorded are details of outcomes on a sample basis (approximately 7%) covering advice outcomes (such the amount of benefit gained, debt managed or written off and employment tribunals won) and client outcomes (such as impact on health, relationships and confidence).

Further information on this unique and powerful dataset, including application procedures is available here.  Citizens Advice are particularly keen to hear from researchers where the research proposal would help demonstrate the impact of their service, particularly covering employment issues, tribunal outcomes, welfare benefits, debt and housing.