John Perry and Steve Vale
Office for National Statistics, UK
1. Organisation
The Business Registers Unit (BRU), led by John Perry, manages the UK Inter Departmental Business Register (IDBR). It currently has 96 staff, including several part-timers, and is organised in three distinct strands:
• Data inputs and business profiling - Linda Scott
• Customer support, training & documentation - Claire Powell
• Register tools and development - Gill Williams
The BRU is part of the Statistical Framework Division, which has responsibility for frames, sampling, classifications, harmonisation and geographic information systems.
A separate team of 7 staff led by Steve Vale is responsible for re-engineering the IDBR and reports to the Statistical Modernisation Programme within ONS, with BRU as the customer.
BRU manages the Business Register Survey (BRS), which is used to update business structures, and is the main source for local unit employment, classification and location details.
Register Outputs
Register counts by size, economic activity and location are produced annually, and are available free of charge via the National Statistics website. The 2004 version is published on the web site on 19 October, having been enhanced in terms of content and coverage as a result of a major cross-government programme to develop Neighbourhood Statistics (NeSS). The NeSS programme is also funding register projects to introduce standard classification methods and tools across government departments that supply administrative data for the IDBR.
Current size of register (September 2004)
|
|
Count |
Employment (thousands) |
|
Proven enterprises
Unproven enterprises based on :
- VAT & PAYE
- Unproven VAT-only *
- Unproven PAYE-only * |
667,000
384,000
736,000
410,000 |
22,852
1,664
1,344
1,132 |
|
Total enterprises |
2,197,000 |
26,992 |
* Potential for some duplication amongst smaller units
2. Issues and problems resolved during the past year
Matching - We have developed a plan for removing the residual duplication on the register and have started to implement it (as described in the paper on matching for session 7).
Agriculture - We have agreement to link the farm holdings register, owned by the UK agriculture department, with the IDBR and have secured funding. Initial matching work has started.
Data release - We now have agreed procedures for the release of microdata to government departments and local authorities for statistical purposes.
3. Issues and problems unresolved during the past year
Coding tools - We are looking at the issues surrounding migration from the Precision Data Coder to Statistics Canada¡¯s ACTR tool for industry coding.
Business register survey - The change to the business register survey questionnaire has been more difficult than anticipated, in particular in collecting industry classification and employment data. The field tests are now to be completed by February 2005.
Corporate registrations ¨CThe UK tax system currently encourages businesses to take out corporate registrations. This has led to a large growth in small units on the register, as businesses that previously operated as sole proprietorships, and people who were previously employees, are taking advantage of the tax benefits and moving into scope of the register. A number of these are using agents for registration and tax purposes making it very difficult to determine the location of the business.
4. Future plans
Re-engineering - The ONS is part way through a ¡®Statistical Modernisation Programme¡¯ to update its computing and statistical infrastructures. As part of this, the business register system is migrating from Ingres to Oracle. An improved interface for users and greater compatibility with other systems are expected to be the main benefits. The exact scope of the re-engineering work is currently being defined jointly with register users and methodologists. The new register is scheduled to be available for use from January 2007.
Allsopp Review of Statistics for Economic Policymaking - This review considered the requirements for data to support the provision of regional accounts to feed the developing needs of regional government. The recommendations included greater use of administrative data and an enhanced role for the IDBR as a hub for linking business data from different sources. The main proposal affecting the business register, is for a merger of the business register survey and the employment part of the annual business survey. This would improve the quality of local unit information on the IDBR and provide a stronger basis for regional estimates from other ONS surveys.
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