Guidance

Engagement strategy to meet the needs of statistics users

Updated 11 April 2024

This document sets out the overall strategy that analysts in the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) and its Arm’s Length Bodies have adopted for meeting the needs of users of the department’s official statistics.

1. Introduction

DLUHC are committed to publishing timely, relevant and high-quality statistics in line with the Code of Practice for Statistics. As set out in the Code, users of statistics and data should be at the centre of statistical production.

2. Our vision

In DLUHC we are committed to improving our statistical user engagement to ensure our statistics are valued, useful and relevant to our users. To do this we will:

• Look to continuously improve our products through ongoing proactive engagement activities with users. In particular we are interested in exploring how we can make our products more interactive and flexible to better meet the needs of our wide-ranging users whilst being mindful of producer burden.

• Place relevance at the heart of our user engagement, working with stakeholders such as local authorities to ensure that our statistics inform evidence on local areas to support the department’s key objective of levelling up the UK.

• Work to embed user engagement throughout the entire statistics production process, from designing forms and methods of data submission to publishing final statistical products and ensuring these are useful for onward analysis by our users.

• Build on the existing Central and Local Information Partnerships (CLIP) central and local government forums and look to better share successes and learn where we can improve.

• Take a holistic approach across a whole topic, where appropriate, embracing innovation to address gaps and working with colleagues across the Government Statistical Service (GSS) to improve coherence for users.

• Seek feedback from internal and external users on our vision and approach, being open and adaptable to change.

3. Key principles

Our strategy for maintaining and developing our partnership with the user community, and evaluating their needs, will be implemented in accordance with the following key principles:

• Clarity – we will explain what sort of statistics we produce, and point users to where they can be found.

• Accessibility – we will ensure the needs of all users are considered, complying with accessibility regulations and make it easy for users to find and download our products, which will be free at the point of delivery.

• Familiarity – we will endeavour to identify our existing users (and, where practicable, our potential users); their interests in our statistics; and the uses to which they are likely to put our statistics. Using this knowledge, we will maintain a regular and constructive dialogue with our key users so that they can make their views known and influence our decisions.

• Inclusiveness – we will recognise the wide diversity in our user community; their differing needs and expectations; their differing degree of familiarity with official statistics; and their different levels of technical expertise.

• Transparency – we will be open about any decisions that are likely to impact on users and we will encourage, welcome, and respond openly to their enquiries, representations and feedback. We will also ensure that our policies and procedures for user engagement are clear and easy to use.

• Prioritisation – we will pay particular attention to the needs of those who use our statistics regularly and extensively – subject to our overall commitment to the user community as a whole.

• Coherence – we will liaise with users and manage their needs in a co-ordinated, holistic and cost-effective fashion in order to maximise the benefits and minimise the burdens.

• Planning – we will ensure that ‘user engagement’ continues to be an integral feature of our statistical planning and prioritisation procedures.

• Value for money – we will aim to meet users’ needs in the most efficient and cost-effective way, and in a manner which is mindful of the reporting burden placed on data providers.

• Innovation – we will seek new and better ways to share our products, in particular looking for opportunities to make outputs more interactive and flexible.

4. Access to our statistics

Our primary means of communicating and engaging with our customers will continue to be through our portfolio of statistical products which are typically accessed through the DLUHC statistical pages of the GOV.UK website. This will direct users to a range of supporting subject-matter areas dedicated to the dissemination of the department’s official statistics. Each publication provides contact details for the responsible statistician and user feedback is encouraged.

Users will be able to download statistical releases from these subject-matter areas which incorporate commentary on, and summaries of, our statistics as well as links to supporting tables which contain more disaggregated statistics. In a small number of cases, some products are only released as ‘live tables’.

Our statistical releases are accompanied by technical notes which set out the methodology, data quality, definitions and other information about the release.

Some statistical releases are also accompanied by interactive dashboards which enable further exploration and allow users to customise the dashboard to obtain statistics of interest.

Some data can also be found on Open Data Communities including the English Indices of Deprivation from 2019 and the English Indices of Deprivation from 2015.

Links to the statistical releases on our website can be found in the Statistics: Release Calendar.

5. Understanding our users

Our customer-base is comprised of a wide range of individuals and groups who represent the whole spectrum of users, and who use our statistics in a wide variety of ways:

• Ministers and officials in DLUHC itself use our statistics to formulate and gauge the effectiveness of government policies covering such areas as housing, homelessness, land use, planning, etc, and to allocate budgetary resources to local authorities.

• Ministers and officials in other government departments and agencies use our statistics to meet their own policy aims and objectives. For example, HM Treasury utilise our data on local government finance as a key input to the Budget and the Ministry of Defence use a range of housing and homelessness data to monitor the Armed Forces Covenant.

• Parliament and politicians use our statistics to provide a window on the work of government, and to call the Executive to account.

• Organisations in other countries, and especially international organisations, use our statistics as a performance benchmark when making international comparisons.

• Local government councillors and officials use our statistics (e.g. on housing) to prioritise, plan, target and manage the services they provide to the communities within their own administrative areas.

• Academics, researchers, and students have used our data for further analysis e.g. as predictors of societal outcomes.

• Charities, voluntary organisations and other similar organisations use our statistics (e.g. on homelessness) to assess and develop appropriate intervention strategies.

• Opinion-formers and the media use our statistics to evaluate the state of the nation; to monitor the government’s performance against its stated aims (relating, for example, to house-building); and to draw comparisons between local authorities (e.g. with respect to their different levels of council tax).

• Citizens and communities use our statistics to judge the record of their elected representatives on issues such as local taxation, social housing, local services, etc. And for information about their local area.

Our users also include data providers in local authorities, housing associations and other organisations who provide us with the data we need to publish local authority and national statistics. All data we collect from local authorities are included on the Single Data List, a list of all data returns that central government requires from local government.

We engage regularly with data providers via a variety of methods, including Central and Local Government Information Partnership (CLIP) forums, newsletters, published guidance and webinars. We know that some providers are also users of the data, for example using the data for internal metrics and benchmarking.

6. Communication with users

We will exploit the full range of opportunities for developing and strengthening our links with users to give them a voice in the production and development of our official statistics.

This includes:

• High-level representation – where possible and appropriate, we will either participate in, or make representations to, any recognised user groups or user focused events sponsored by bodies such as the UK Statistics Authority, the Office for National Statistics (ONS), the Royal Statistical Society (RSS), etc.

• Direct user interface – we will continue, and develop, our alliances or relationships with any individuals, bodies, associations or user groups with a vested interest in our statistics. This includes various stakeholder advisory groups, including the Central and Local Government Information Partnership (CLIP) groups.

• Public consultations – we will consult users and the general public after we introduce a new product, or when we are contemplating the withdrawal of a statistical product or service, or a substantial modification to our procedures for collecting, compiling or producing statistics.

• Feedback – we publish guidance on the DLUHC website and in our statistical releases on how users can provide us with feedback on our products and services, and on their experiences with using DLUHC’s official statistics, so that their opinions can inform future activities and releases. Should users wish to engage on wider statistical issues, they are welcome to do so by emailing us: enquiries.officialstatistics@levellingup.gov.uk.

7. Customer service standard

We will endeavour to be as approachable and as helpful as we can, and we will aim to provide a satisfactory level of service by delivering a regular portfolio of statistical products and services that are timely, relevant and fit for purpose.

We recognise, however, that things can sometimes go wrong. We may, for instance, make mistakes when producing or publishing our statistics, or we may fall short of our own delivery or service standards. In such circumstances, we will welcome constructive comments, criticism, and complaints because they will help us to improve our customer service. If things do go wrong, we will apologise and do everything we can to put things right.

8. Additional details

Further details of the users and uses of individual statistical series can be found in the technical notes which are published alongside each release.