Transcript General preconditions Training workshop on ¨censuses using administrative registers in Geneva 21 May 2012 Harald Utne, Statistics Norway [email protected].

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General preconditions
Training workshop on ¨censuses using administrative
registers in Geneva 21 May 2012
Harald Utne, Statistics Norway
[email protected]
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Preconditions for use of administrative sources
in production of statistics
• Legal base
• Public approval
• Unified identification system
• Comprehensive and reliable register system
• Cooperation among authorities
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Legal base
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National legislation should reflect the idea of re-use of administrative
data for statistical purposes
Legislation should be up-to-date
– Statistics Act of Norway from 1989
– Replacing the former act of 1907
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Legislation must give the NSI
– Access to administrative data on a unit level, including identification
information
– Right to link data from different administrative sources
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Legislation on data protection
In Norway: Principle of “One way traffic”
Administrative data for statistical purposes
Statistical data for
– Statistical purposes
– Research purposes (regulated by Statistics Act)
– Never for administrative purposes
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Public approval
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Broad public approval is very important
– Influence on political decisions (legal base)
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Attitudes may be different between countries concerning
– Existence and linking of administrative registers in general
– Linking of register data for statistical purposes:
 Lack of privacy: NSI knows “everything” about “everybody” (Big Brother) or
 Data security better taken care of in centralized system
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Citizens may be reluctant to report data to the NSI if they know that the
same data have already been collected for administrative purposes
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Common Nordic experiences
– Work of register authorities (and NSIs) should be open and transparent
– Open discussion and public debate
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Unified identification system
• Unique identification numbers for basic units
– Persons, enterprises and establishments, numerical addresses
• Unique ID-numbers not absolutely necessary, but indeed
very valuable
– Matching is possible without unique numbers, but more difficult and
time consuming
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Comprehensive and reliable register
system
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Quality in administrative data important for individual’s rights and duties
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But: “Administrative” quality is not always the same as “statistical”
quality
Registers used by many authorities (incl. NSI) have best quality
Information items that are important for administrative authorities, have
the best quality
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Cooperation among authorities
Between different administrative authorities (registers owners)
Between NSI and the registers owners
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Cooperation at all levels of the organisations
Norway: National forum of register owners and users
The NSI needs a lot of information about the registers
– Regulations and practices in register keeping
– Contents
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Register owners should inform the NSI about all kind of changes
– In Norway regulated in the Statistics Act
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The NSI should inform the register owners about quality problems
– But normally not on an individual level
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The Quality Circle
Public sector
Statistics
Private sector
Use
Work together
Quality
Updated information
Quality secured
Full coverage
Documentation
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Requirements to data from
administrative sources
Additional requirements for producing
high quality register-based statistics
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Units and identifiers
Definition of units
• No problem for natural units (for example persons)
• Business units: Must be defined by very precise rules
– New enterprise established or major changes in existing enterprise?
Unique identifiers
• Identifying codes should not be changed during the lifetime of a unit
• Best solution: Using codes containing no information
• Example: Norwegian personal ID
– Contain date of birth and sex: Changes may occur
– Temporary ID-number changed to permanent ID-number
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Time references and data on events
• Important to have dates of changes and events
– Real point in time when possible: Births, deaths
– Sometimes gradual changes: Industry of an enterprise
• Dates of actual changes and dates of registration
• Distinguish real events from corrections in registers
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Thank you for your attention !
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