Government Statistical Service (GSS) Harmonisation Team workplan 2024

Current harmonised standard

The current harmonised standard for ethnicity is based on the questions used in UK censuses in 2011.

The recommendation is that people choose their own answer to the question about their ethnic group. This is because ethnicity will mean something different to each person.

It is also recommended that this standard is used together with the religion harmonised standard and national identity harmonised standard. The questions should be asked in the following order: national identity, ethnic group, religion.

For the censuses in England and Wales 2021 and Scotland in 2022, the current harmonised standard was reviewed and adapted. This was because of changes in respondent needs. The census questions were produced by balancing the new respondent needs with the need for coherence and comparability.

Because of this comprehensive work, if you are planning to include a new ethnicity question in your data collection and cannot wait for the review work to be completed, the questions in the censuses in England and Wales 2021 and Scotland in 2022 are recommended for data collection for ethnic groups at present. We recognise however, that user and respondent needs may have changed since the census questions were developed.

Progress since 2022

We began work to update the ethnic group harmonised standard following the publication of our initial workplan in 2022. Ethnicity was prioritised in 2022 due to:

• definitions, terminology, and thinking on the topic changing and developing
• events such as the Black Lives Matter movement and COVID-19 pandemic, which have demonstrated the need for more granular ethnic group data
• harmonisation’s response to the Inclusive Data Task Force’s recommendations to ensure the ethnicity standard reflects the diversity of the UK population

Ethnicity continues to be a focus for Harmonisation as an emerging priority of the future of population and migration statistics in England and Wales.

The broad aim of the work is to improve the inclusivity of the question for minority ethnic groups. We have now finished the research and early engagement work and published the findings from phase 1 and phase 2 of this discovery phase in 2023. These reports outline the issues discovered with the current question, as well as data user needs.

Priority activities

Priority activities for this next stage of work include:

• testing possible improvements and changes to the question design
• considering how any proposed changes to the ethnicity questions will impact the national identity and religion harmonised standards – in terms of how they are used and ordered when collecting data on cultural identity

Timescale

The project timescales are guided by Agile and Respondent Centred Design methodologies, adopting a ‘gold’ approach to our question design. Progress updates about the work and any revised timescales will be published on this page in early 2025.

We are now working to design and test updates to the ethnicity standard.

We expect to finish our research in the following timescales:

• online mode – March 2025
• paper mode – September 2025

These standards will be published thereafter, pending relevant approval and sign-off.

Other data collection modes will be designed after this.

Current harmonised standard

To collect data on disability in line with the Equality Act (2010) for Great Britain or the Disability Discrimination Act (1995) for Northern Ireland, the current recommendation is to use both of these standards together:

• long-lasting health conditions and illness harmonised standard
• activity restriction harmonised standard

Users can also collect data using the impairment harmonised standard. This will give more information about the things that people self-report they can or cannot do. These questions were developed before the UK censuses in 2011.

Progress since 2022

Work to update the disability harmonised standards began following the publication of the initial workplan in 2022. Since then, a review has been conducted to establish user needs, and a publication of the findings identified:

• the strengths and weaknesses of the current standard
• user needs for disability data
• areas for potential improvement

Priority activities

Priorities identified for future work on the disability harmonised standard include:

• a further in-depth review of the topic area
• additional work with stakeholders and user groups to capture any further user needs
• tests of possible improvements and changes to the question design for the disability standards

Timescale

Project timescales will be guided by feedback from stakeholders during the user engagement activities and developed in line with the ‘gold’ approach to question design. Progress updates will be provided on this page in early 2025.

Work is now resuming on the planned discovery research and early engagement work. The findings are expected to will be published in early 2025.

After this, work will begin to update the questions, ensuring they reflect the findings of the discovery phase. We anticipate this work will begin in 2025 when discovery is completed.

We expect to finish our research in the following timescales:

• online mode – November 2025
• paper mode – May 2026

These standards will be published thereafter, pending relevant approval and sign-off.

Other data collection modes will be designed after this.

Current Harmonised Standards

Gender Identity

Our previous ‘under development’ gender identity harmonised standard, published in July 2020, was created using research and testing undertaken for Census 2021 in England and Wales. It was published as ‘under development’, acknowledging the need for further research to develop the standard. However, there are limitations to the data collected from this question. As of 12 September 2024, the gender identity estimates from Census 2021 are no longer accredited official statistics and are classified as official statistics in development. The ONS requested this change in designation after patterns were identified in the Census data that suggested that some respondents may not have interpreted the Census 2021 gender identity question as intended, notably those with lower levels of English language proficiency. In November 2023 an ONS report on the quality of Census 2021 gender identity data noted this bias, and analysis of Scotland’s 2022 Census trans status and history data has added weight to this observation. More information can be found in the final report on the quality of Census 2021 gender identity data, and in the National Statistical blog about the strengths and limitations of gender identity statistics.

Therefore, we have archived our gender identity data harmonised standard while we work to develop new harmonised standards for sex and gender identity. We have replaced the archived standard with new guidance for producers of statistics and researchers who are currently using, or thinking about including, a gender identity question on their surveys or in their administrative data collection.

Sex

There is currently no harmonised standard on the topic of sex. Published harmonised standards include definitions, survey questions, suggested presentations, and information for data users. However, sex harmonisation guidance is available alongside Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR)’s guidance for collecting and reporting data about sex and gender identity in official statistics.

Latest Update – Sex and gender identity

Work on the topics of sex and gender identity were paused from Summer 2023 until Autumn 2024, due to a series of reviews of gender identity data quality in the Census 2021 in England and Wales, which the gender identity harmonised standard was based on. This includes ONS’ review on quality of Census 2021 gender identity data and OSR’s review of statistics on gender identity. An independent review of data, statistics and research on sex and gender has also been commissioned by Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT). Whilst this review has not been published yet, we are sharing our updated workplan and priority activities for these topics in line with the Office for Statistics Regulation’s recommendation.

As of 12 September 2024, the gender identity estimates from Census 2021 are no longer accredited official statistics and are classified as official statistics in development. The new classification is more consistent with the ‘under development’ status of the current Gender Identity harmonised standard.

Our workplan, including phases of development, follow. Timescales for each phase of development are provided in the final section of this plan.

Upcoming Work

We are now launching a new phase of work towards agreed harmonised standards for sex and gender identity data collection. Harmonised standards allow people to effectively and accurately compare data that has been collected across different datasets. The harmonised standards we develop will consider both the collection of primary research data, and the secondary use of administrative-based data for research purposes.

To ensure we develop robust harmonised standards which best meet our user needs, we will be implementing best practice methodology throughout our upcoming work. Agile methodology and principles of Respondent Centred Design will be central to our approach. We will begin this work from the start of the development life cycle, and we will be conducting extensive user engagement so that we have a robust understanding of stakeholder needs. Further information about this methodology is provided in the “Question Design Methodology” section of this workplan. The findings we gather from this engagement will directly inform the future harmonised standards we develop for these topics.

Throughout this workplan, we are using the term “user” to refer to producers of statistics and data users. We are using the term “respondents” to refer to people who will be answering data collection questions and providing data during survey-based data collection, administrative-based data collection, or during testing research to develop harmonised standards.

We will be user and respondent-led on this work, and we will use the findings from each phase of user engagement and question testing to directly inform our subsequent work. As a result, we do not know yet what all of our end-to-end outputs will look like. Our workplan therefore sets out our overall work phases, and our upcoming plans for user engagement, and establishes the methodology we will use to produce updated harmonised standards for these topics. As sex and gender identity data collection is important internationally, we will also engage and learn with international colleagues. Updates on our work will be published regularly throughout the development cycle.

Question Design Methodology

The work we undertake to develop finalised harmonised standards for sex and gender identity will adopt a ‘gold’ approach to Respondent Centred Design (RCD).

By implementing RCD principles in our methodology, we will develop harmonised standards for this topic that allow diverse respondent groups to easily provide data about sex and gender identity. We will do this by conducting research with a wide range of respondents with different lived experiences (including transgender people, people who are not transgender, people with intersex traits, and people with lower English language proficiency) to understand their needs. We will then build question prototypes based on these needs and test these with the UK population to determine their suitability. The Respondent-Centred Design Framework provides more information.

Agile methodology emphasises the importance of gathering user needs early in project delivery, and using these needs to inform all subsequent work you undertake, to ensure your end-product is fit for purpose and meets the needs of users and respondents. Agile delivery consists of three main phases prior to going live; these are Discovery, Alpha, and Beta.

By following an Agile approach to our work, we aim to ensure that final harmonised standards for sex and gender identity are developed iteratively based on the needs of our users and the feedback we gather from respondents. This should result in final harmonised standards that are effective, fit for purpose, and meet the needs of statistical producers, data users, and future participants in survey or administrative-based data collection. More information about Agile delivery in a question development context can be found in the survey development toolkit guidance, produced by the ONS Data Quality Hub and the GSS Harmonisation team.

Discovery Phase

The Discovery Phase is about gathering insights from users and respondents about their needs. User needs refer to the requirements of statistical producers and data users. Respondent needs include usability, acceptability, and question comprehension.

Early in 2025 we will be holding a series of regional events across the UK to launch our Discovery phase, where we will listen to stakeholder needs for questions and data on these topics. We will conduct further deep-dive requirements sessions to reflect the importance of hearing from a range of user and respondent voices in this phase and will publish our findings to ensure transparency. If you want to receive information about these events please contact us via outreach.engagement.community@ons.gov.uk

The Discovery phase will inform how our engagement approach develops in remaining phases, taking into account feedback from stakeholders. We will ensure on-going engagement throughout the development process

Part of our work in this phase will include qualitative research to understand how different groups of respondents conceptualise the topics of sex and gender identity. This means learning about what they draw upon to reach that understanding, the thought processes that take place when surveyed, and how different questionnaire response options are understood.

Alpha Phase

The Alpha phase is about using the insights gathered from Discovery research to make evidence-based decisions about question design. Question prototypes are designed, tested through research, refined based on research feedback, and then retested. This iterative improvement process continues until a final question design has been produced that is testing well and meets both users’ and respondents’ needs. During this phase we will also carry out further testing with the wording used for the England and Wales Census 2021 and Scotland’s Census 2022 within the context of changing social norms and respondent and user needs. As part of this process, we will also consider wording from other countries on the topic. This is in line with recommendations from the Inclusive Data Taskforce and will feed into our understanding of the strengths and limitations of different approaches.

In this phase, we will design and test questions for use as new harmonised standards. We will conduct testing research with a wide range of different UK populations to gather insights and respondent feedback about the questions we have developed. We will use these findings to iterate and improve the questions, until we have prototypes that are testing well qualitatively.

Beta Phase

The Beta phase is about quantitatively testing the questions that have been developed, at scale. This gathers statistical survey data insights and the ability to evaluate the effectiveness of the question design.

Our plans for this will be informed by work in previous phases. They will be developed as we learn more about the concepts in use and question iterations throughout the Alpha phase. Therefore, we do not have finalised plans for this phase at the current time. We will provide updated information on planning for this phase as we publish progress reports throughout our development.

Timescales

The project timescales will be guided by the feedback we gather from stakeholders in our Discovery user engagement activities. We will publish a review of our Discovery engagement findings in Summer 2025. Our plans for further work, based on the outcomes of our Discovery engagement activities, and updated project timescales will also be published in Summer 2025.

Our timelines for our Discovery engagement work are as follows:

• January 2025 – start of Discovery engagement activities
• Summer 2025 – conclusion of Discovery engagement activities; publication of Discovery engagement findings; publication to refine plans for the next work phases

Once we have completed and reviewed our Discovery engagement findings, we will use this information to determine the designs to take forward into the Alpha phase of work, and to scope any additional research activity needed to ensure a robust question design.

Our prospective timelines for Discovery and Alpha phases of our work are as follows:

• September 2025 – completion of Discovery research
• Autumn 2026 – completion of Alpha phase for online mode

These timelines will be reviewed based on the findings of our user engagement work. We will publish an update in Summer 2025. This will include an updated timescale for this work, including plans for Beta phase testing of the proposed standard design. There will be engagement sessions at the end of each phase to share research outcomes.

Our prospective timelines for finishing qualitative research for the development of updated sex and gender identity harmonised standards are as follows:

• Autumn 2026 – online self-completion mode, applicable for survey or administrative data collection
• Spring 2027 – paper self-completion mode, applicable for survey or administrative data collection

These standards will be published thereafter, pending quantitative review, relevant approval and sign-off.

Standards for other data collection modes will be designed after this.