Minutes of the CLIP Labour Market Statistics Sub-Group meeting held on 21 September 1999
Present:
Mrs M Haworth (Chair) - Office for National Statistics
Ms J Tuffnell - Cambridgeshire County Council
Mr P Sturman - Tyne & Wear County Council
Mr L Johnson - West Midlands Joint Data Team
Mr A Morton - South Lanarkshire County Council
Mr T Martin - Kent County Council
Mr C Lloyd - l Worcester County Council
Mr D Blair - National Welsh Assembly
Mr R Halliday - Scottish Executive
Ms T Williams - Office for National Statistics
Mr J Partington - Office for National Statistics
Mr R Laux - Office for National Statistics
Mr G Kinshott - Office for National Statistics
Mr I Bell - Department for further Education and Employment
Mr A Brown - Department of Environment, Transport and the Regions
Mr S Hicks - Department of Trade and Industry
Ms C Baker (Secretary) - Office for National Statistics
Apologies:
Ms J Whitworth - Local Government Association
1 Minutes of the last meeting held ion 27 April 1999
The minutes of the last meeting were agreed. Ms Howarth explained that it was intended to hold two strategic meeting a year and data meetings as required.
2 Matters arising from previous minutes
A note on the progress of the action points was circulated before the meeting. The following actions were discussed.
2.1 Action Point A: Mrs Blake to find out from Inland Revenue if they publish earnings data for smaller areas.
Action A - Information to be sent out with minutes.
2.2 Action Point H: Mr Partington to get legal advice on IDBR access being denied to the London Research Centre and the West Midlands Joint Data team.
Action H – Ms Tuffnell explained that some access had been granted Mr Partington said he would investigate.
ACTION A: ]Mr Partington to investigate why access that was previously denied to IDBR is now being allowed and pass information back to this group
2.3 Action Point J: ONS to circulate a paper on how county GDP figures are calculated
Action J – Clarification to be sent out with minutes.
ACTION B: Secretary to send out clarification on GDP county figures with minutes
2.4 Action Point O: Mr Bird to find out about the legal implications of notifying local authority non-respondents to the Local Government Association.
Action O – Mr Cousins at Newport advises that Mr Bird cannot inform the local government association of the local authority non-respondents, because of the confidentiality of data.
Ms Tuffnell said that she did not find this acceptable.
ACTION C: Mr Partington to discuss with Mr Cousins at Newport the issue of notifying LA non-respondents to the Local Government Association in the near future
2.5 Action Point W: Mrs Blake to look into the possibility of there being a LA representative on GSS (LMS).
Action W – Secretary’s note: a paper has been prepared for the 20 May meeting of GSS (LMS) expressing the demand for a full census of businesses.
Mr Partington informed the meeting that there were plans to expand the size of the ABI which would double in size, which would not be the same as a full census but would cover about two thirds of work places.
ACTION D: Ms Howarth to write to Dennis allnut and flag up for LMILG the strong feeling from the LAs that there should be a full census and funding from LA side and others
2.6 Action Point AA: Mr Partington to let IDBR know that they should inform customers about forthcoming revisions to data on the IDBR.
Action AA - Cleared - James Partington relayed this point to BRU on 30 June 1999. The timing paper will clarify these issues.
ACTION E: Mr Partington to produce a paper on the strategy of the IDBR before the next meeting in November
2.7 Ms Tuffnell said that they were receiving spreadsheets from IDBR with inadequate documentation and needed guidance on how to read the spreadsheets.
2.8 Somebody from Business Registers Unit will be invited to attend the meeting in November.
ACTION F: Ms Williams to consult with data supplier on guidance for meta data for spreadsheets
3 2001 Census
3.1 Mr Laux reported that the 2001 census would be coded to output areas with non-standard mappings to produce a whole range of geographies.
3.2 Mr Laux said that the 91 census was not considered particularly successful because of unavailability of ILO definition and miscoding of students.
3.3 Ms Tuffnell wondered about education and training issues, as there was a need to monitor National Training targets. Mr Bell said that lifelong learning would be dealt with at the next meeting.
ACTION G: Mr Bell to provide more information on lifelong learning at next neeting and provide a copy of the paper on DfEE strategy for monitoring national learning targets to the secretary for distribution
ACTION H: Mr Laux to provide a paper for next meeting on what happened during census consultation and how information in this area can be used.
3.4 Mr Lloyd brought up the issue of whether employment quality, underemployed and seasonality were going to be picked up in the census.
ACTION I: Mr Laux to provide a paper for the next meeting on what the census does in the area of employment quality, employment and seasonality
3.5 Ms Tuffnell asked how the unpaid family workers were treated on the census. Mr Laux replied that they were treated the same as the LFS ILO definition which was as being in work.
3.6 Ms Tuffnell said she was concerned about the huge differences between SOC 90 and SOC 2000 and said that it was important to get a comparison between the two. Mr Kinshott replied that there was a bridging group looking at data sets and he would reiterate to them the importance of having a time series.
ACTION J: Mr Kinshott to produce a paper for next meeting on continuity and linking for SOC 90 and SOC 2000
3.7 Ms Williams will be attending the census output meeting in November.
ACTION K: Ms Wiliams to invite somebody from census to attend the next CLIP meeting
3.8 The Local Authorities expressed concern over incomes data.
ACTION POINT L: LAs to make representation on census consultation
ACTION POINT M: Mr Laux to make sure that the LA's views are included in consultation and confirm deadlines
4 Indicators
Sustainable development
4.1 Mr Brown told the meeting that consultants have started work on the set of indicators.
4.2 The group felt that they were not involved in what is happening on the main CLIP group. There were loads of sustainable development indicators but only some of them were related to Labour Market Statistics and this group had members that had specific views and would like to be involved in commenting on the indicators.
4.3 Mr Brown invited to e-mail any comments that they had to him. His e-mail address is AlanH_Brown@detr.gsi.gov.uk.
4.4 The first set of indicators were published in 1996.
4.5 Deborah Heenan the DETR nominated officer for the CLIP pilot project has sent information on the Local Indicators of Sustainable Develpoment which are attached to these minutes ( Annex A).
ACTION POINT N: Mr Brown to feed back to Hilary Hillier this group's concerns that the employment rate is not included in the indicators.
ACTION POINT O: Ms Haworth to write to Mike Highes to draw his attention the problem that there are ne clear communications links between the CLIP subgroups
ACTION POINT P: Mr Brown to find out what definitions and data sources are being used for the indicators and what geographical levels are available and pass information back to CLIP group
ACTION POINT Q : Mr Bell to ask the employment service about New Deal data for LAs, with confidentiality undertaking
Regional Competitiveness
4.6 Paper CLIP 4/99 was distributed prior to this meeting
4.4 Timetable on Labour productivity to go in manufacturing to go in minutes !!!!
4.5 Capital – Ms Tuffnell raised the problem that under Research & Development Intensity and Employee jobs in High Technology Industry there was the problem the amount of jobs were being underestimated because the definition is out of date.
4.6 On future developments Mr Hicks informed the meeting that there were plans for Labour productivity figures for the service sector. The GSS LMS committee had discussed regional competitivity. A paper would be distributed .Any comments should be sent to ONS.
ACTION POINT R: LAs to write to either Mr Everett or Ms Doughty at DETR with their concerns about the definition of high technology industries being out of date and how they think it should be improved
ACTION POINT S: Mr Hicks to make the next liaison meeting at the DTI aware that the definition for high technology industries needs to be changed
ACTION POINT T: Secretary to circulate GSS LMS paper on regional productivity
Local Deprivation Index
4.7 Paper CLIP 5/99 was distributed prior to this meeting.
4.8 Mr Morton wondered if L.A.’s would get access to the index when it is produced and whether New Deal would be part of it and what geographic level would be available.
ACTION POINT U: Mr Bell to clarify with these minutes what are the plans for the future outputs of the index
4.9 Ms Tuffnell asked if ONS were involved in the denominators used in calculating the figures. Ms Howarth replied that Social and Regional Division had some input. Mr Sturman informed the group that Oxford University had issued a set of denominators that were available by e-mail. The e-mail address is index99@ermine.ox.ac.uk.
4.10 DFEE will fund projections of employment for every region.
ACTION POINT V: Mr Bell to find out what progress DfEE had made with projections for every region and clarify in these minutes
5 SOC 2000
5.1 Paper CLIP 5/99 was circulated to the group previous to this meeting. Mr Kinshott gave a presentation on the SOC 2000 groupings.
5.2 If anybody has any questions or wants any clarification send an e-mail to the secretary and she will pass this on to Mr Kinshott.
5.3 Publication of SOC 2000 will take place in spring 2000.
ACTION POINT W: Ms Williams to report back on when ONS will implement SOC 2000 on various data sources
6 Boundary changes and data implications
6.1 Mr Morton informed the meeting that the introduction of proportional representation would mean the loss of 1/3 of wards which would mean bigger wards.
Perhaps ONS could consider using the postcode sector database as a building block for Scotland. Ms Williams explained that the move to GRS system should help and would provide a paper update. The claimant count would be moving to a postcode geography but LFS and Nomis would still be on old councils.
6.2 Mr Morton explained that a postcode basis would be preferable on two counts; 1.Keeping up with changes in geographies 2. Balance of continuity.
ACTION POINT X: Ms Williams to provide a paper on geographic referencing strategy and progress on main data sets
ACTION POINT Y: Mr Bell to distribute the latest on the standard geographies for the UK
7 Any other business
7.1 Ms Haworth informed the meeting that the next meeting in November would address IDBR, AES and ABI. It will be a focussed meeting with only people who are interested attending. A lot of the issues will be dealt with by information papers prior to the meeting.
ACTION POINT Z: Ms Williams to define who is looking at indicators on lifetime learning & education at LMILG by May 2000
8 Next meeting
8.1 The next meeting of the group will be a data meeting that will be held on 18 November 1999. The next strategic meeting will be in May 2000.