28 August 2008
Provision of services for the 2011 Census in NI
Lockheed Martin UK Ltd has been commissioned to support the delivery of the 2011 Census for Northern Ireland.
The contract, which has been awarded jointly with the Office for National Statistics (ONS), includes provision of a customer contact centre, questionnaire printing and data capture and processing. All data processing will be carried out in the UK.
Building on lessons learned from 2001, the design of the census has been amended for 2011. Census questionnaires will be posted to the majority of households in Northern Ireland and a questionnaire tracking system will help NISRA keep track of progress and chase up responses. For the first time people will be able to fill in the census online as well as through traditional paper questionnaires.
The collection, processing and analysis of information from around 700,000 households is a complex project run by NISRA with the support of a range of specialist service providers - using the best specialist expertise available to provide the most cost effective solution. The census is planned to be held on 27 March 2011 and will create around 2,000 short term jobs in the operational period.
The contract awarded to Lockheed Martin UK is to design the processing systems to capture the data and to coordinate the day-to-day running of operational services provided by a consortium of UK and European partners.
NISRA staff are responsible for the design of census procedures and field operations, quality assurance, secondary processing, analysis and the publication of results.
All the information collected is owned by government, it is protected by law and it will not leave the UK. There are also stringent operational and contractual processes and safeguards in place to maintain data security and confidentiality.
Background Notes
- The Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA) is responsible for conducting the Census in Northern Ireland.
- The Office for National Statistics (ONS) is responsible for carrying out the census in England and Wales.
The General Register Office for Scotland (GROS) is responsible for carrying out the census in Scotland.
- Census is carried out every 10 years. It is a count of all people and households, and the most complete source of information about the population that exists. It is a complex logistical exercise and covers over 700,000 households in Northern Ireland.
- Census data are relied upon by central Government, local government, the health sector, businesses and market researchers, academic researchers and the education sector, genealogists and the public at large for a countless range of purposes. Census data are used to allocate resources to local government and health authorities, to target investment and plan services. Census is also used for policy making and monitoring, and for academic and market research.
- The consortium of UK and European partners providing day to day operational services consists of Royal Mail, Cable & Wireless, Logica, Polestar, Oracle, UK Data Capture, Broadcasting Support Services (bss) and Steria.
- NISRA has put in place a number of safeguards to protect the confidentiality of census information. Further information on confidentiality and data security. The safeguards include:
- All data processing will be carried out in UK - no data will leave or be held at any point outside the UK;
- All data is the property of government and only UK/EU owned companies will have access to the data
- All those who have access to the full Census data set in the operational data centre will be NISRA or ONS staff.
- NISRA and ONS will control system access rights to all data systems;
- Everyone working with census data will sign declarations of confidentiality
- Independent checks by an accredited UK security consultancy of both physical and electronic security will be carried out for NISRA and ONS
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