Research and analysis

Equality, diversity, and inclusion statement for the Five-Year Ofsted Inspection Data

Updated 22 March 2024

Applies to England

Has ‘due regard’ been made to the 3 aims of the General Duty (Section 149 of the Equality Act 2010)?

These are: 1. eliminate unlawful discrimination, harassment, victimisation and any other conduct prohibited by the Act 2. advance equality of opportunity between people who share a protected characteristic and people who do not share it 3. foster good relations between people who share a protected characteristic.

The Official Statistics data, which feeds into the Five-Year Ofsted Inspection Data, continues to be available on the Statistics at Ofsted page and will be the alternative replacement solution.

The Five-Year Ofsted Inspection Data, in its OpenDocument Spreadsheet (.ods) format, is fully accessible. All underlying data in the Five-Year Ofsted Inspection Data is already available in the Official Statistics (linked to above).

In making this data fully accessible, we are eliminating discrimination against those with accessibility needs, ensuring equality and fostering better relations.

Have all the protected characteristics been considered: age; disability; gender reassignment; pregnancy and maternity; marriage and civil partnership; religion and belief; sex; and sexual orientation?

The Five-Year Ofsted Inspection Data is available to the public, who use it to explore inspection data on children’s social care, early years, further education and skills, initial teacher education providers and state-funded schools from the last five academic years.

We took need the needs of disabled people into account when making the documents accessible, particularly the needs of those who require workplace adjustments and those who use assistive technology.

The Five-Year Ofsted Inspection Data is in an accessible format, so we are ensuring that users can access the data they require. We have not identified any other potential adverse effects, when considering the remaining eight protected characteristics.

Have the relevant stakeholders been involved and/or consulted?

We sought legal advice, and the advice was that case law (summarised in Plantaganet Alliance Ltd v Secretary of State for Justice) has established that consultation is (usually) necessary when:

1. legislation sets out a duty to consult (a ‘statutory’ duty)
2. there has been a clear promise to consult or an established, consistent practice of consultation that creates a ‘legitimate expectation’ of consultation
3. in exceptional cases, a failure to consult would lead to conspicuous unfairness

If none of these three factors are present, there is no obligation to consult. However, this does not mean that a consultation cannot be undertaken.

In this case, there is no statutory duty to consult and no reason to believe that conspicuous unfairness would be caused by not consulting. We know that the data could be viewed on Twitter and retweeted in its current format. We have no reason to believe that it would not be accessible or understandable.

There is a legitimate expectation (because it is our established practice) that we carry out a consultation when there is a change to the Official Statistics that we publish. However, here we are not changing the Official Statistics that we publish; we are changing the way that we make the data available and making it available in additional ways. There is no change to the substance of what is available. To make that change in a procedurally fair way (where there is no duty to consult), we are giving meaningful notice to those who use (.ods) format. We are letting users know about the change in good time (a) at the place on the internet where they log on to look at the data; (b) at the time when most users might log on to look at the data, for example when there is a new data release; (c) and where our data will continue to be available. If you would like to get in touch to ask questions or raise concerns, please email the team at: DataDevelopment@ofsted.gov.uk

Have the legal team been consulted on any legal matters arising?

We have sought legal advice on the addition of this product and considered the legal implications as part of this process. Ofsted’s Executive Board has been engaged on legal matters as appropriate throughout.

What have you done to ensure that the views of affected members of staff have been considered?

Not applicable.