Developing Social Indicators in the UK and EU

Elaine Squires

United Kingdom representative - Social Protection Committee’s Indicator Sub-group

Overview

• Background to social inclusion in the EU

• Developing indicators – UK and EU

• Using UK indicators and the Laeken set

• Lessons to be learned and future indicators

Social Inclusion in the EU

• Need to make a ‘decisive impact’ on social exclusion by 2010

• Strategy for individual member states but

• ‘open method’ of co-ordination allows action to be harmonised across EU– Commonly agreed indicators– National Action Plans– Action Programme

The Open method

• Based on approach adopted for the European Employment Strategy

• Improves national strategy through shared learning

• Supports transnational analysis of social exclusion

• ‘Joint Inclusion Report’ based on National Action Plans

The UK Government’s Strategy

Opportunity for all annual report and devolved poverty reports

UK strategy based on a lifecycle approach– for children, breaking cycles of deprivation– for people of working age, access to work– for older people, security in retirement– for communities, tackling the problems of deprived

neighbourhoods

• Also based on rigorous analysis– wide range of indicators of social exclusion

Developing social indicators

What makes a good indicator?

• Relevant to the Government’s strategy

• Related to the ‘outcomes’ the Government wants to achieve rather than the ‘processes’

• Based on publicly available and statistically robust data

– National Statistics guidelines

• Unambiguous interpretation

EU principles on indicators

• Clear normative interpretation

• Robust and statistically valid

• Responsive to policy but not subject to manipulation

• Comparable across member states

• Timely and susceptible to revision

• Not impose a large burden

Developing the Ofa indicators

• Range of indicators to capture many different aspects of poverty and social exclusion

• Consistency across Government with other indicators

• Reviewed annually - indicators added this year on:– Families in temporary accommodation– Care leavers – destinations– Juvenile reconviction rates

Laeken indicators

• First set of 18 common indicators agreed in 2001:– Low income– Employment– Education– Health

• New indicators agreed on in-work poverty and literacy

Using indicators

Children

• Children more at risk of poverty in UK

• UK strategy based on– Improving family incomes– support in early years (SureStart)– tackling educational disadvantage– help with transition to adult life

• Elimination pledge and related PSA targets

Risk of poverty for age 0-15

Source: Households Below Average Income seriesOfa Indicator

Percentage of children living in relative low income (below 60% median income)

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

1996/97 1997/98 1998/99 1999/00 2000/01 2001/02 2002/03

BHC

AHC

Risk of poverty for age 0-15

Laeken indicator 1a

Percentage of children (0-15 years) below 60 per cent of national median income - 2001

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

Denm

ark

Finlan

d

Sweden

Belgium

Austri

a

Germ

any

Nethe

rland

s

Franc

e

Greec

e

Luxe

mbo

urg

EU15 a

vera

ge

United

King

dom

Italy

Irelan

d

Spain

Portu

gal

Source: European Community Household Panel

Policy Transfer - Children

• Measuring child poverty– adopting internationally recognised indicator– looking at measure of deprivation (Ireland)– Ambition to be amongst best in EU

• Also looking at Scandinavian approach– to parental employment – to childcare

Working Age

• Removing barriers to work– making work possible– making work pay– making work skilled

• Support for those for whom work is not currently an option

• Number of PSA targets on employment and worklessness

Individuals in jobless households (0-60)

Laeken indicator 7, 2002 data

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002

EU15

UnitedKingdom

Source: Eurostat Labour Force Survey

Individuals in jobless households

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

20

1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002

0-59

0-15

Ofa indicatorsSource: Labour Force Survey

Employment rates of disadvantaged groups

Employment rates for Disadvantaged Groups (GB)

0.0%

10.0%

20.0%

30.0%

40.0%

50.0%

60.0%

70.0%

80.0%

1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003

All working age

Over 50s

Ethnic Minority People

Lone Parents

People with disabilities

Source: Labour Force SurveyOfa indicator

Policy Transfer- Working Age

• UK has amongst the most flexible labour markets in the EU

• But still need to focus on vulnerable groups, unskilled and poor areas

• Can use the NAP process to focus on what works well, eg– France is developing new employment policies– regional policies in Germany

New ways of working

• EU has no direct control over UK social inclusion strategy

• Many UK strategies operate at national level

• NAP allows us to work across these boundaries

• Active engagement with EU in this area important– allows us to learn from best practice across 25 countries– Benchmarking UK performance– can help to join up action across UK– supports partnership and participatory ways of working

Lessons for future

• Laeken indicators provide important trans-national comparisons:– Difficult to reach agreement– Need to look at range of indicators to explain positions of MS– Data problems of next few years

• Still need a range of national data– can be more up to date– provides more detail– addresses UK priorities– covers existing UK targets

Future indicators

• EU level work underway looking at:– Pensions– Health care– Housing

• UK:– Continue to review and improve indicators with

better/new data– Child poverty – material deprivation from 2006