Collection

Ethnicity data: data quality resources

This page links to reports and blog posts on ethnicity data quality issues, written by analysts in the Race Equality Unit (formerly the Race Disparity Unit).

• From: Race Disparity Unit and Race Equality Unit
• Published: 4 January 2022
• Last updated: 29 October 2024 — See all updates

Blog posts

The Race Equality Unit (formerly the Race Disparity Unit) has produced the following blog posts to help users understand important aspects of data quality:

• Communicating the quality of ethnicity data, August 2024
• My take on equalities data, January 2024
• Data on inequalities: approaches, issues and challenges, December 2023
• Improving ethnicity data standards, April 2023
• Tackling online abuse, April 2023
• Attributing ethnicity using someone’s name, May 2022
• Harmonising decentralised data collections, April 2022
• Improving reporting and reducing misuse of ethnicity statistics, March 2022
• Comparing ethnicity data for different countries, January 2022
• Asking people about their ethnicity, June 2021
• Why data harmonisation is important, January 2021
• Why we’re talking more about how we collect and analyse data on ethnicity, April 2020
• Piecing things together, April 2020
• Using location data in tackling ethnic disparities, October 2019
• How can the public sector collect better data on staff ethnicity?, July 2019
• How we’re helping people understand ethnicity data, June 2019
• Making ethnicity data more coherent and comparable, June 2019
• 50 years of collecting ethnicity data, March 2019

Methods and quality reports

The following reports cover the use and interpretation of ethnicity data, data about particular ethnic groups, and ethnicity data improvement.

Use and interpretation of ethnicity data

• Aggregating ethnicity data to improve data quality
  • 30 June 2023
  • Research and analysis
• Ethnicity data: which differences in ethnic group data are real?
  • 21 December 2021
  • Research and analysis
• Differences in the quality of ethnicity data reported by individuals and third parties
  • 3 December 2021
  • Research and analysis
• Stop and search data and the effect of geographical differences
  • 31 March 2021
  • Research and analysis
• Using relative likelihoods to compare ethnic disparities
  • 18 August 2020
  • Research and analysis

Data about particular ethnic groups

• Ethnicity facts and figures: Gypsy, Roma and Irish Traveller ethnic group
  • 9 February 2022
  • Research and analysis
• Ethnicity data: how similar or different are aggregated ethnic groups?
  • 22 December 2020
  • Research and analysis

Improving ethnicity data

• Quality Improvement Plan: government ethnicity data
  • 17 April 2020
  • Policy paper

Published 4 January 2022
Last updated 29 October 2024 + show all updates

1. 29 October 2024

   Added links to 2 blog posts written by Richard Laux, Chief Statistician in the Cabinet Office, and published on the Government Analysis Function blog.

2. 29 January 2024

   Removed links to 2 blog posts published on the Government Analysis Function blog in December 2023 and January 2024 that have since been removed.

3. 22 January 2024

   Added links to 2 recently-published blog posts written by Richard Laux (Head of Analysis in the Equality Hub) for the Government Analysis Function blog.

4. 30 June 2023

   Added links to 3 new publications – 2 blog posts, and one methods and quality report.

5. 4 January 2022

   First published.