Welcome
Welcome to our newsletter for April. The last few months have been very busy for us all, with plenty of exciting activities happening at the UK Data Service.
To start with, I’m delighted to announce the UK Statistics Authority recently approved our re-accreditation for the provision and preparation of data under the Digital Economy Act.
This is a key milestone for the Service, with only 12 organisations in the UK having received this accreditation. This authorises us to continue with effectively supporting researchers to access de-identified data by public authorities for accredited research purposes, supporting valuable new research that provides insight into UK society and the economy.
We've also successfully completed two important projects supporting the data infrastructure community in the UK. These projects include a Population Research UK project to build capacity in data management and an ADR UK-funded project on how to advance synthetic data use in the UK research ecosystem.
Looking forward, we'll be turning our attention to our annual UK Data Service user conferences in June and July. This includes the UK Census User Conference, the Labour Force and Annual Population Surveys User Conference, the Health Studies User Conference and the Family Finance Surveys User Conference.
These events are an ideal opportunity to learn about recent developments across the data landscape and I look forward to meeting many of you there.
Our team will also be in attendance at IASSIST 2025, which will be held at the University of the West of England in Bristol this year. A large contingent of Service staff will be presenting on our current work at the conference, and you’ll be able to meet the team at our sponsor booth throughout the week. We are looking forward to reporting back from this event in an upcoming newsletter.
And as if that wasn't enough, we've also been nominated as a finalist in the Not-For-Profit of the Year category at the British Data Awards 2025!
I'd like to thank you all for your continued support and I hope you enjoy this edition of the UK Data Service newsletter.
Regards,
Steve McEachern,
Director, UK Data Service.
To get in touch please email: comms@ukdataservice.ac.uk. |
Search our data catalogue for further information about the datasets in our collection.
Users can also filter our online news stories to find the latest datasets and editions added to the data catalogue.
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The UK Data Service is pleased to announce the successful delivery of the Population Research UK – Skills Development for Managing Longitudinal Data for Sharing project. This initiative aimed to build capacity in data management within the Longitudinal Population Studies (LPS) community. Funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and Medical Research Council (MRC), the project sought to address critical skills gaps by providing high-quality training for data managers working with longitudinal studies. |
Save the dates
12 June
UK Census User Conference 2025
The UK Census User Conference, organised by the UK Data Service, will take place in central Manchester and online on 12 – 13 June 2025.
19 June
Labour Force and Annual Population Surveys User Conference 2025
This free conference, organised by the UK Data Service in collaboration with the Office for National Statistics (ONS), will be held at University College London on 19 June 2025.
23 June
Health Studies User Conference 2025
Do you want to know the latest developments in health data from social surveys? Are you interested in research using health data? This free online conference is organised by the UK Data Service in collaboration with UCL and the National Centre for Social Research.
1-3 July
Understanding Society Scientific Conference
The Understanding Society Conference takes place every other year and is an opportunity for researchers from around the world to share the latest research on longitudinal household panel studies.
9 July
Family Finance Surveys User Conference 2025
Are you interested in research on family finances? Do you want to know the latest developments in family finance data from UK social surveys?
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The UK Data Service has been nominated as a finalist in the Not-For-Profit of the Year category at the British Data Awards 2025. Winners will be announced at a ceremony at the Brewery in London on 14 May.
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The Research Accreditation Panel of the UK Statistics Authority approved the accreditation of the UK Data Service for the provision and preparation of data, reinforcing our commitment to information security. |
The UK Data Service is pleased to be supporting a project led by the VCSE Data and Insights National Observatory that is seeking to understand how a well-designed data infrastructure can amplify the voice of the VCSE sector, working with the British Red Cross, DataKind UK and the University of Strathclyde.
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We are delighted to announce the completion of the “Balancing the data scales: A cost-benefit analysis of low-fidelity synthetic data for data owners and providers” project, which examined the value and potential of synthetic data for data owners and Trusted Research Environments (TREs).
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Forthcoming training sessions
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In the first of its kind, we have worked with Beth Armstrong from the University of Sheffield to produce a case study around the creation of a new dataset. Food and You 2 is an official statistics survey commissioned by the Food Standards Agency (FSA), covering England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
The survey measures people’s self-reported knowledge, attitudes and behaviour relating to food safety and other food-related behaviours.
Food and You 2 includes a wide range of topics including food safety in the home, food insecurity, eating out and takeaways, food hypersensitivities, healthy eating, and a variety of emerging issues from willingness to eat lab-grown meat, to awareness of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) and the use of cannabidiol (CBD) products.
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2025 marks the 10th anniversary of the Data Impact blog. The Data Impact blog continues to be a place where we encourage a more discursive approach to understanding and developing data impact. It is also a place to share best practice in data impact and keep the data impact community up to date with news, events and the latest data-driven impactful research and policy making. We are always eager to hear from researchers on your experience of accessing data via the Service. Below are a few recent blog posts which show how research projects use our data to make a real-world impact. Some key posts:
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Media watch: The UK Data Service in the news
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from theguardian.com - 27 February 2025 "Data from the 2021 census spurred one man to help gay people in Rochford, Essex to feel more accepted. In the 2021 census, the district of Rochford in Essex was shown as the straightest place in England, after only 1.6% of the population identified as LGBTQ+." This article references data which is available in the UK Data Service collection: 2021/22 Census |
from www.independent.co.uk - 20 February 2025 "The latest research is based on estimates from the 10 to 15-year-olds Crime Survey for England and Wales in the year ending March 2024." This article references data which is available in the UK Data Service collection: Crime Survey for England and Wales |
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from probonoeconomics.com - 21 February 2025
"The latest ONS Opinions and Lifestyle survey release paints a somewhat troubling picture of the wellbeing of the country. As we approach the five-year lockdown anniversary, PBE CEO Matt Whittaker assesses how we're doing."
This article references data which is available in the UK Data Service collection: Opinions and Lifestyle Survey
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from politicshome.com - 19 February 2025 "Jane Goddard, Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the Building Research Establishment (BRE), is calling for a focus on retrofitting the leas." This article references data which is available in the UK Data Service collection: English Housing Survey |
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We would like to know when you successfully publish research informed by data you have accessed via the Service. Contact our Impact Team if you are interested in contributing to a blog or submitting a case study.
Also, when you cite the data correctly, that helps us to measure our impact, but if you let us know directly, we can investigate opportunities to further promote your research.
Help us to shape our New Catalogue
We shall be undertaking user testing on our catalogue, if this is something you would like to be involved with please contact comms@ukdataservice.ac.uk.
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Colchester, Essex, CO4 3SQ.
© Copyright 2025 University of Essex.
Created by UK Data Archive, UK Data Service.
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