Representative
About
The ONS is keen to establish a long term, small area geography policy which will be used for Census 2011 and Neighbourhood Statistics. The aim is to support the production of coherent and useful data that can be used with confidence by all organisations.
The consultation paper is available online. This describes all policy proposals, the background to them, and a number of attendant issues. Please take the time to get involved by responding to the survey and joining in the debate around the blog posts.
Latest Posts
- The consultation has now closed .........
- Consultation period ends this Friday (16th Feb)
- Do you use Output Areas?
- Don't forget the surveys
- How important are postcodes?
- Should boundaries be tied to the real world?
- Festive messages
- Health data? Ethnicity data? Do we need bigger areas?
- Consultation document
- OAs and SOAs - Stick or Twist?
Postcodes
Posted by LSC Planning Manager (not verified) on 26/01/2007 - 12:06
The proposal to use alternative grid references in place of postcodes overlooks the use of the postcode by planners such as the LSC in determining access to and penetration of services.
Postcodes can be linked to individuals in a way that other references can't. As a result, they are hugely useful in supporting the use of multiple, varied datasets that enable monitoring of participation/non-participation by ethnicity, disability, gender etc. They allow comparisons to be made between a range of factors (i.e. compare learning take-up with receipt of Incapacity Benefit.
The prospect of having to identify a grid reference for every person who enrols in learning (or uses any public service) is enough disincentive for anyone dealing with data. Not to mention the havoc it would wreak on all existing MI systems.
If this is desirable, then introduce it alongside postcodes as an additional planning and modelling tool for data and research.
I can see there would be benefits of this approach, but I also know that the likelihood of introducing any reliable method of matching postcodes to the new system would be remote - at a stroke disabling most govt MI systems.