Office for National Statistics: Data for Statutory Functions

The Data will be used for the fulfilment of ONS’ statutory functions set out in the following sections of the Statistics and Registration Service Act (SRSA) 2007, including the production of official statistics, subject to the applicable procedural controls detailed in this DSA:

1. Permitted Uses

ONS may use the Data for the purposes of the ONS’ functions set out in the following sections of the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007:

• Section 20: Production, Publishing, and providing advice on Statistics produced under S20 Official statistics

• Section 21: Compilation, Maintenance and Publishing of Retail Prices Index (RPI) [Statistical analysis]

• Section 24: Delegated Functions [Research & methodology]

• Section 25: Census, Birth registrations, etc.

• Section 26: Ancillary powers [Other statistical functions]

Uses of the Data for these purposes will be subject to the following procedures:

1.1 Permission to request and/or be given access to the Data for the above purposes is restricted to ONS personnel only.

1.2 ONS personnel identify a requirement to access a specific NHS England data asset to fulfil an ONS statutory function in response to objectives which may originate from a range of personnel, including (but not limited to) Ministers, Government Officials, Senior Directors within ONS, or through internally commissioned analytical or statistical needs.

1.3 The identified requirement is then allocated to the appropriate User(s), who assume(s) responsibility for progressing the task.

1.4 The purpose for access will be documented as an Access Request, clearly defining:

a. the aims and objectives of processing

b. what data will be processed

c. the relevant statutory function(s) the processing is necessary to achieve, and

d. the potential outputs that may be created from the access

1.5 For each use, an ethical self-assessment will be undertaken. Where indicated by the self-assessment tool, the proposal will require approval from the National Statistician’s Data Ethics Advisory Committee (NSDEC). NSDEC’s role is to scrutinise and where necessary challenge, the ethical basis for the work as new statistics are proposed.

1.6 The User(s) determine(s) the appropriate Workspace within the security controlled ONS analysis environment where the data asset could be accessed and analysed.

1.7 The User(s) submits the Access Request to the relevant Workspace Owner.

1.8 The Workspace Owner receives the request and consults key stakeholders including, Information Asset Owners (IAOs), Data Ethics Team Members and the Data Acquisition Team to assure:

a. the purpose aligns with one or more of the above statutory functions

b. the proposed use of the Data is necessary and proportionate to achieve the stated aims

c. the proposed use of the Data aligns with the Workspace’s recorded purpose based on the specific area of analysis

d. the proposed use of the Data aligns with any permissions, purposes and restrictions set by NHS England

e. there is assessment and consideration of the risks and impacts of adding the data asset to the Workspace, considering existing approved assets already within that Workspace

1.9 If all stakeholders agree the data asset is appropriate for use and can be used within the Workspace; the ONS IAO formally approves the request and inclusion of the data asset, and the Workspace Record is updated to reflect the approval.

1.10 The Workspace Owner submits a formal request to the ONS Operational teams to add both the user(s) and the approved data asset to the Workspace.

1.11 On receipt of the request, ONS Operational teams, through embedded security process, assess the request to ensure:

a. The user holds the correct security clearance

b. Corporate mandatory training on security awareness and data handling is complete, along with any additional platform training and guidance

c. The user has read, understood, and agreed to comply with platform Security Operating Procedures (SyOPs)

d. All IAO approvals are correctly recorded in the Workspace Record

1.12 The security team ensures due process has been followed and if any compliance issues are identified, they must be remediated by the Workspace Owner within a specified deadline for the request to be approved.

1.13 The User(s) is granted access to the Workspace within the assured, security controlled ONS analysis environment.

1.14 Security teams conduct regular access audits and update processes. ONS maintains comprehensive oversight mechanisms including:

a. Full audit logs of all user activity

b. Records of personal data processing

c. Up to date lists of approved users and their access levels

The above can be provided to NHS England on request.

1.15 Access to the Workspace for the User(s) is revoked when it is no longer required for business purposes.

2. Uses Permitted Subject to Additional Approval from NHS England

Subject to additional written authorisation from NHS England on a per purpose basis, ONS may use the Data for the purposes of the ONS’ functions set out in the following sections of the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007:

• Section 22: Statistical services

• Section 53A: Onward Disclosure to Devolved Administrations

Uses of the Data for the purposes of Section 22: Statistical services will be subject to the following procedures:

2.1 ONS will submit a written request to NHS England detailing:

a. the third-party organisation(s) on whose behalf ONS intend to provide the statistical services

b. confirmation of the location of the third-party organisation(s)

c. the aims and objectives of processing

d. what data will be processed to provide the statistical service

e. the potential outputs that may be created from the processing including the recipients of the outputs

f. the expected public benefit

2.2 NHS England will consider the request and confirm in writing approval for ONS to proceed, any conditions of that approval, or that approval is not granted.

2.3 If NHS England approval is confirmed, the process for granting access to the data for ONS users to complete the request will be as defined above for the purposes of functions 20, 21, 24, 25 and 26.

3. Onward Disclosure to Devolved Administration of the UK

Uses of the Data for the purposes of Section 53A: Onward Disclosure to Devolved Administrations of the United Kingdom will be limited as follows:

3.1 ONS may share record level data sourced from the Personal Demographics Service (PDS) dataset with NRS to ensure a higher level of accuracy for the large number of moves between Scotland and England & Wales. The data shared will be limited to the following variables only:

a. Gender

b. Date of Birth

c. NHAIS Posting

d. NHAIS Posting Business Effective From Date

e. Previous Posting (from Registration Request)

f. Type of Registration

g. Reason for Removal Type

h. Reason for Removal Business Effective From Date

3.2 ONS is permitted to share the above data items with NRS on condition that ONS ensures there are adequate controls in place to ensure that NRS:

a. must not combine the data with other datasets which could potentially increase the risk of reidentification of individuals in the dataset

b. must not attempt to re-identify individuals in the dataset

c. must not onwardly share the dataset

d. must use the dataset solely for the defined purpose of the production of cross-border flows between the four countries of the United Kingdom, using the movement of people, as part of population estimates for the United Kingdom for the Population Estimates Unit, and

e. must not publish the data

3.3 ONS must maintain a Data Sharing Agreement with NRS (signed by both ONS and NRS) as a means of applying the above controls.

3.4 If ONS wishes to share any other NHS England Data with any of the Devolved Administrations, ONS must first obtain written permission from NHS England.

4. Third Party Access

ONS may grant third party access to the Data for the purposes of the ONS’ functions set out in the following sections of the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007:

• Section 23: Statistical research

Uses of the Data for the purposes of Section 23: Statistical research will be subject to the following procedures:

4.1 There must be a legitimate requirement to use NHS England Data linked with other data, excluding data held by the researcher(s), that is not sourced from NHS England or obtained by ONS from a common source such as Civil Registration Births and Deaths data. ONS may not grant researchers access to data that can entirely be obtained directly from NHS England.

4.2 Permission to request and/or be given access to the Data for the above purposes is restricted to:

a. Accredited Researchers (defined as "an individual who has been accredited to access de-identified data for statistical and research purposes under section 64 of the Digital Economy Act 2017 and/or section 39 of the SRSA, and in accordance with the UK Statistics Authority’s ‘Research Code of Practice and Accreditation Criteria’".)

b. Approved Researchers (defined, under Section 39(5) of the SRSA, as "for the purposes of subsection 4(i)...an individual to whom ONS has granted access, for the purposes of statistical research, to information held by it". The prerequisites and process for becoming an approved researcher are the same as those for accredited researchers under the Digital Economy Act 2017 (DEA), as set out above. Consequently, all approved researchers are recognised as accredited researchers and vice versa.)

Note: Individuals are accredited; not organisations. It is plausible that an accredited/approved researcher may be employed by or act on behalf of a commercial organisation. However, the individual must meet the criteria for accreditation and will not be given approval for commercial purposes which are not expected to achieve public benefit.

4.3 An applicant must be accredited under the Digital Economy Act (DEA) via People and Project Services (PSS). Accreditation can run in parallel with project application submission.

4.4 Applicants consult the Metadata Catalogue (https://ons.metadata.works/browser/landing) to verify the dataset access conditions. This includes stipulations on safe settings and assured organisational connectivity.

4.5 Using the Project Accreditation Service for the Secure Research Service (PASS) online forms, the applicants complete an application specifying the project aims, methodology, data requirements, team roles, machine learning use (if applicable), and planned external dataset ingests.

4.6 The applicant must define the roles and responsibilities of the project team, including:

a. Project Coordinator (mandatory)

b. Deputy Coordinator (optional)

c. Accredited Researchers

d. Output Reviewer

4.7 If the application meets the minimum requirements, ONS begins a formal assessment. This assessment includes:

a. Initial application checks for completeness, clarity and alignment with the published accreditation criteria

b. Feasibility and ethics assessment against accreditation criteria including an ethics review carried out by the Centre for Applied Data Ethics

c. Information Asset Owners (IAOs) are consulted if necessary

d. The UK Statistics Authority, acting on behalf of the Research Accreditation Panel, reviews the project and researcher for accreditation

e. Additional risk-based review (if required)

4.8 Where a project involves higher levels of risk, further review and accreditation may be undertaken by the Research Accreditation Panel or the National Statistician’s Data Ethics Committee.

ONS must request and obtain written confirmation of approval from NHS England before approving any projects accessing NHS Data and which involve:

a. Use of data at higher risk of reidentification, or

b. Use of novel processing methods such as projects planning to use Artificial Intelligence or machine-learning models

4.9 Researchers may receive multiple rounds of questions at any time throughout the application process from feasibility, ethics, governance, or security teams.

4.10 Once approval is in place, the project space is created and access to the data will be provided.

4.11 Researchers may also send approved data to the Statistical Support team to be added to the project space. This should be included in the External Datasets section of the initial project application.

4.12 A complete record of the accredited researchers and their projects will be published on the UK Statistics Authority website to ensure transparency of access to data for research.

4.13 Researchers work in the project space until the completion of their project. Once completed, access is revoked.

1. General Processing Activities:

No data will flow to NHS England for the purposes of this Data Sharing Agreement (DSA).

NHS England will provide the Data to ONS.

The Data will contain directly identifying data items which are required to link the Data at record level with data already held by the recipient.

The data is transferred to the ONS Secure Estate, where it undergoes virus scanning before being ingested into a security controlled ONS analysis environment.

Identified data are managed by a small group of security cleared, highly trained specialists. They are responsible for de-identifying, cleaning, and, where required, linking the data to other sources before relocating it to a secure area within the security controlled ONS analysis environment.

ONS personnel may access only the data necessary to perform their statutory functions, within a designated workspace. Access is restricted to de-identified data for most functions. Identified data may be accessed only where the relevant function cannot otherwise be performed, including, but not limited to, where necessary for assessments of data quality or survey sampling.

Data security for storage, management and linkage will be provided through a security controlled ONS analysis environment with the following elements of security control:

• Access to the data is restricted to individuals granted access on the basis of a justified need to access the data

• Controlled ingest and export of data into/out from the environment

• Controlled account access using unique credentials based on job role

• Logged and monitored access of user activity within the environment

• Secure build configuration for infrastructure

• Vulnerability tested infrastructure with appropriate remediation and patching

• Compliance checks against security enforcing controls

• Architectural review against standards and best practice

• Staff security cleared to the appropriate level based on their supervised and/or unsupervised access to sensitive data in accordance with ONS clearance policies and data access processes

• Education and awareness of environment users covering security policies and secure working practices

• Operational support processes to securely manage the environment

• Risk assessment to identify security risks and mitigation actions to reduce this risk

Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Google Cloud Platform (GCP) provide IT hosting services to ONS and will store the data as contracted by ONS as a processor.

ONS will never seek to intentionally re-identify this Data.

2. Processing Activities Specific to ONS Providing Access to NHS England Data to Approved/Accredited Researchers:

Data will only be accessed by Accredited/Approved researchers within the Secure Research Service (SRS) or a security controlled ONS analysis environment. ONS personnel will process the data within a security controlled ONS analysis environment to de-identify it and then transfer it to the SRS environment in readiness for accredited/ approved project access.

Accredited/Approved researchers will only be able to access the de identified data necessary and approved for their research project.

The SRS is hosted on Crown Hosting Data Centres; they provide IT hosting services to ONS and will store the data as contracted by ONS as a processor.

• Accredited/Approved researchers may access data in the SRS via ONS operated Safe Rooms or ESRC approved SafePods.

• Accredited/Approved researchers may access data in the SRS through accredited Safe Rooms operated by partner institutions.

• Accredited/Approved researchers may access data in the SRS via assured organisational office-based connectivity where required security standards are met.

• Accredited/Approved researchers may access data in the SRS through approved organisational homeworking arrangements where secure remote access standards are satisfied.

3. Processing Activities Specific to ONS Sharing NHS England Data with Devolved Administrations:

Where ONS intends to share PDS data with Devolved Administrations, the relevant data will be prepared within the security controlled ONS environment and transferred to the appropriate statistical authority using a secure file-transfer process.

NHS England does not mandate a single format for the disclosure of PDS data to a Devolved Administration from ONS. Disclosures may be made in any secure file transfer format that:

• complies with ONS security and information governance requirements;

• enables clear and complete audit trails;

• provides transparency regarding the data shared and the method of transfer.

The expected outputs of the processing will be:

1. Official Statistics

These include National Statistics (once quality standards are met) and other recognised official statistical releases. They are normally published on the ONS website and include, but are not limited to:

• Annual birth statistics (including child and infant mortality; unexplained infant deaths)

• Population and migration statistics, such as:

- Internal migration (annual)

- Mid-year population estimates

- Population projections (national & subnational)

• Mortality, morbidity and life expectancy statistics, including breakdowns by:

- Ethnicity

- Disability

- Age groups

These outputs are typically accompanied by statistical bulletins, commentary and data tables.

2. Experimental Statistics

Used when new methods or administrative data sources are being tested before possible accreditation as official statistics. Examples include, but are not limited to:

• Statistics derived from NHS England Data as part of Admin Data Census work

• Linked-data studies (e.g., suicide rates among higher education students)

• New population estimation approaches using administrative data

These outputs help improve data quality, methods and future official statistical products.

3. Research Outputs & Analytical Articles

These are produced when methods, linkages, or data quality are still being developed. Examples include, but are not limited to:

• Research updates in the Administrative Data Census project

• Analytical articles on (not an exhaustive list):

- Coronavirus-related deaths

- Ethnic contrasts in mortality

- Long-COVID prevalence

• Reports validating models such as QCOVID

• Ethnicity data quality comparisons across sources

These may appear as analytical articles, reports, blogs, presentations or updates for specialist audiences.

4. Methodology & Quality Assurance Reports

These outputs describe how ONS develops, tests and quality-assures data linkage and statistical methods, including, but not limited to:

• Methods for linking sibling/family units

• Assessments of how administrative data (e.g., birth notifications, HES, PDS) can support population statistics

• Methodological updates for the Administrative Data Based Population Estimates (ABPEs)

• Feasibility studies for administrative data based Census characteristics

These may be internal or published, depending on maturity.

5. Derived Datasets for Research

ONS produces de-identified, non-disclosive datasets for controlled research access, including, but not limited to:

• Administrative Based Census (ABC) dataset

- Age, sex and LSOA only

- Built from PDS, HES, ECDS, and other sources

- Made available via Trusted Research Environments

These are not statistical publications but structured data products for approved researchers.

6. Survey Outputs

ONS uses PDS data to sample or boost participation in key surveys, including, but not limited to:

• Survey data outputs and reports for:

- Health Insight Survey (HIS) – patient experience & inequalities

- Children’s Crime Survey for England & Wales (CCSEW) – from 2025

- Safety During Childhood Survey – pilot (2025) and full survey (2026)

• Nationally representative estimates relevant to crime, wellbeing and public health policy

Outputs include national estimates, survey analysis and policy-relevant insights.

7. Technical Briefings & Expert Audience Reports

These are targeted outputs, often not publicly released, including, but not limited to:

• Briefings for Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE), British Medical Association (BMA) Royal College of GPs (RCGP)

• Reports for Treasury and ICBs on programmes like the Health and Growth Accelerator

• Internal quality reports on ethnicity data

They summarise analyses but do not include unpublished statistics.

8. Presentations, Stakeholder Updates & Engagement Materials

ONS routinely communicates progress through:

• Presentations at events, workshops and stakeholder meetings

• Updates to technical and general audiences

These support transparency and user engagement.

Accredited official statistics (that ONS produces) are used as the population baseline for any statistics that are published on a per capita basis. The Department of Health and Social Care and their agencies specifically use both census and population statistics (branded as accredited official statistics) in the planning and provision of health and social care services and the allocation of funding.

• Improvements to existing Official Statistics

• Development of new Official Statistics – this may involve testing to investigate whether statistics of sufficient quality can be produced, and may also involve the production of statistics badged as ‘experimental’ while further work is done to improve quality aspects such as accuracy

• Quality assurance of Official Statistics

• Development of commentary around Official Statistics

• Replacement of current survey questions – developing statistics from available data to directly replace the need to collect the information through survey questions

• Improving efficiency or accuracy of sampling – for example, ensuring that a representative sample of the target population is taken when conducting a survey of the public, such that the statistics produced from the survey are the best possible reflection of reality

• Research and development of methodology – for example, using data to develop and test linkage methodology that is ultimately used to help produce statistics based on other data rather than the original data source

Yielded Benefits is not a requirement for new applications.