Statistics
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January spotlight on statistical work in Scotland
1st February 2023 by Ally McAlpine
Reading Time: 5 minutes In my first blog as Chief Statistician, I spoke about the vital role statistics play in enriching the evidence base. I am passionate about the role statisticians can make to develop better policies for the people of Scotland. In Autumn 2022, I followed up by setting out our mission across the...
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The More We Speak the More Trusted We Become!
22nd September 2022 by Ally McAlpine
In my last blog I promised a packed conference that would challenge our thinking when we get back into the office. And boy! Did the organising team manage that? This was evident from the “Flash Talks” and parallel sessions. They really highlighted the breadth and depth of innovative and impactful work that goes on across...
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Improving the Speed and Accuracy of Agricultural Statistics
16th February 2022 by Ally McAlpine
This month, the team are looking at improving the speed and accuracy of our agricultural statistics. They focussed on the computer code and the time taken from receiving data to producing statistics. And, we are learning from gaming and software development. In simple terms, it is a way of coding that removes errors. It also...
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Sex and Gender in Data
22nd September 2021 by Katie Lyne
By Roger Halliday, Chief Statistician, Scottish Government. Today I am publishing the guidance on sex and gender in data. This is for those who collect data, covering how they should think about what data they need, and some standard approaches to collecting and publishing this data. This is an important contribution to my aim...
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Research Data Scotland – Information Governance Progress
12th August 2021 by Katie Lyne
Who We Are Research Data Scotland (RDS) is a collaboration between the Scottish Government, Scotland’s leading academic institutions and public bodies. Our aim is to improve economic, social and environmental wellbeing in Scotland. We will do this by enabling access to and linkage of data about people, places and businesses for research in the public...
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Research Data Scotland moving forward
21st July 2021 by Katie Lyne
by Roger Halliday, Chief Statistician Developments are progressing at pace for the launch of the Research Data Scotland (RDS) service. Publishing the Outline Business Case for RDS is an important milestone in this work. The business case highlights the strong case for RDS and the reasoning behind why we’ve set it up. To improve the...
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Bespoke Data Access Requests – an update
28th October 2020 by datasharingandlinkage
by Roger Halliday, Chief Statistician Over the last few months, we have faced an extraordinary situation in relation to COVID-19 and all the challenges that has brought and we thought it was a good time to touch base regarding our data access arrangements. The current situation has progressed enough to allow a slight decreased in...
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Counting people in hospital with COVID-19
15th September 2020 by Office of the Chief Statistician
We are changing the way we count people in hospital with confirmed COVID-19 as of 15 September 2020. The new figures are lower than the previous published management information and we have a break in the time series. This blog explains why and how. Current situation Every day since mid-March, the Scottish Government has been...
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Analysis and data around COVID-19
4th June 2020 by Office of the Chief Statistician
Current analysis and data around COVID-19 Scottish Government (SG), Public Health Scotland (PHS) and National Records of Scotland (NRS) have been working together to produce a range of information to provide insight into the COVID-19 pandemic and the effect it is having in Scotland. Scottish Government publish daily coronavirus data for Scotland (updated each day...
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COVID-19 – Priority Bespoke Data Access Requests
27th May 2020 by datasharingandlinkage
By Roger Halliday, Chief Statistician The use of data has greatly assisted us in understanding COVID-19 and will help our response to the pandemic. The use of data for this type of research is very important and gaining access to the appropriate data remains both legal and ethical. To ensure that we balance...