Annual Population Survey, January - December, 2006

UKDA study number:5685

Principal Investigator

Office for National Statistics. Social and Vital Statistics Division

Sponsors

Office for National Statistics
Department for Work and Pensions
Department for Education and Skills
National Assembly for Wales
Scottish Government
Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency. Central Survey Unit

Distributed by

UK Data Archive, University of Essex, Colchester.

September 2007

Bibliographic Citation

All works which use or refer to these materials should acknowledge these sources by means of bibliographic citation. To ensure that such source attributions are captured for bibliographic indexes, citations must appear in footnotes or in the reference section of publications. The bibliographic citation for this data collection is:

Office for National Statistics. Social and Vital Statistics Division, Annual Population Survey, January - December, 2006 [computer file]. Colchester, Essex: UK Data Archive [distributor], September 2007. SN: 5685.

Acknowledgement

Any publication, whether printed, electronic or broadcast, based wholly or in part on these materials, should acknowledge the original data creators, depositors or copyright holders, the funders of the Data Collections (if different) and the UK Data Archive, and to acknowledge Crown Copyright where appropriate.
Any publication, whether printed, electronic or broadcast, based wholly or in part on these materials should carry a statement that the original data creators, depositors or copyright holders, the funders of the Data Collections (if different) and the UK Data Archive bear no responsibility for their further analysis or interpretation.

Copyright:
Crown copyright material is reproduced with the permission of the Controller of HMSO and the Queen’s Printer for Scotland

Disclaimer

Although all efforts are made to ensure the quality of the materials, neither the original data creators, depositors or copyright holders, the funders of the Data Collections, nor the UK Data Archive bear any responsibility for the accuracy or comprehensiveness of these materials.

All rights reserved. No part of these materials may be reproduced, stored in, or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the UK Data Archive.

UK Data Archive
University of Essex
Wivenhoe Park
Colchester
Essex C04 3SQ
United Kingdom
www.data-archive.ac.uk

5685 . Annual Population Survey, January - December, 2006

Depositor:

Office for National Statistics. Social and Vital Statistics Division

Principal Investigator:

Office for National Statistics. Social and Vital Statistics Division

Sponsors:

Office for National Statistics
Department for Work and Pensions
Department for Education and Skills
National Assembly for Wales
Scottish Government
Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency. Central Survey Unit

Abstract:

The Annual Population Survey (APS) is a major survey series, which aims to provide data that can produce reliable estimates at local authority level. Key topics covered in the survey include education, employment, health and ethnicity. The APS comprises key variables from the Labour Force Survey (LFS) (held at the UK Data Archive (UKDA) under GN 33246), all its associated LFS boosts and the APS boost. Thus, the APS combines results from five different sources: the LFS (waves 1 and 5); the English Local Labour Force Survey (LLFS), the Welsh Labour Force Survey (WLFS), the Scottish Labour Force Survey (SLFS) and the Annual Population Survey Boost Sample (APS(B) - however, this ceased to exist at the end of December 2005, so APS data from January 2006 onwards will contain all the above data apart from APS(B)). Users should note that the LLFS, WLFS, SLFS and APS(B) are not held separately at the UKDA. For further detailed information about methodology, users should consult the Labour Force Survey User Guide, selected volumes of which have been included with the APS documentation for reference purposes (see 'Documentation' table below).

The APS aims to provide enhanced annual data for England, covering a target sample of at least 510 economically active persons for each Unitary Authority (UA)/Local Authority District (LAD) and at least 450 in each Greater London Borough. In combination with local LFS boost samples such as the WLFS and SLFS, the survey provides estimates for a range of indicators down to Local Education Authority (LEA) level across the United Kingdom.

End User Licence and Special Licence APS data
Users should note that there are two versions of each APS dataset. One is available under the standard End User Licence (EUL) agreement, and the other is a Special Licence (SL) version. The SL version contains more detailed variables relating to:

• age: including single year of age, year and month of birth, age completed full-time education and age obtained highest qualification, age of oldest dependent child and age of youngest dependent child
• family unit and household: including a number of variables concerning the number of dependent children in the family according to their ages, relationship to head of household and relationship to head of family
• nationality and country of origin
• geography: including county, unitary/local authority, place of work, Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics 2 (NUTS2) and NUTS3 regions, and whether lives and works in same local authority district
• health: including main health problem, and current and past health problems
• education and apprenticeship: including numbers and subjects of various qualifications and variables concerning apprenticeships
• industry: including industry, industry class and industry group for main, second and last job, and industry made redundant from
• occupation: including 4-digit Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) for main, second and last job and job made redundant from
• system variables: including week number when interview took place and number of households at address

The EUL version contains less detailed variables. For example, the lowest geography is Government Office Region, only banded age is available, only 3-digit SOC is available for main, second and last job, and only industry division for main, second and last job. Users are advised to first obtain the standard EUL version of the data to see if they are sufficient for the research requirements.

The SL data have more restrictive access conditions than those made available under the standard EUL. Prospective users of the SL version will need to complete an extra application form and demonstrate to the data owners exactly why they need access to the additional variables in order to get permission to use that version. Therefore, users are strongly advised to order the standard version of the data. In order to help users choose the correct dataset, 'Special Licence Access' has been added to the dataset titles for the SL versions of the data.

APS/LFS Reweighting Project 2007:
In 2007, ONS undertook a reweighting project, whereby APS and LFS data were reweighted using population estimates for 2007-2008. As a result, reweighted editions of APS datasets, and accompanying information about the reweighting project, were deposited at UKDA during 2008 and have been added to the collection.

The ESDS Government Datasets for Annual Population Survey web page has a useful guide to variables included in the APS. For each survey entry, all variables are listed, alongside further details comprising the distribution of each variable and any additional information available.

Hitqua8 issue – December 2009:
During the quality assurance of the July 2008 – June 2009 APS dataset, due for release in December 2009, ONS discovered that there were missing data for the Hitqua8 derived variable across all LFS Main cases in month 10. The Enhanced cases were all present. Hitqua8 had not been derived for about 9,300 out of the 17,000 cases in month 10 where Hitqua8 applies. Data was present for all other months (187,000 cases) and the derivation was correct. So, for the July 08 – June 09 dataset Hitqua8 has been amended with the correct data added for month 10. However, the issue also affects the April 2008- March 2009 dataset (available from the UKDA under SN 6310) and the January 2008 – December 2008 (available from the UKDA under SN 6280), with Hitqua8 having the same missing data for all LFS Main cases in the month 10. No other datasets are effected. Users are advised to either ignore the missing cases (as they are relatively small) or apply adjustments outlined in User Guide 1 so there should be little impact on their results. The datasets will be corrected during the reweighting exercise which is planned to be deposited in Spring 2010.
For the second edition (July 2008) the data have been reweighted using the latest population estimates (2007-2008), and the weighting variable has been recalculated to reflect this. Further details about the reweighting may be found in the documentation. In addition, variables extfu, famunit, hprmb, hrpid, and nurse are no longer included.

The Special Licence version of the APS 2006 is held at the UKDA under SN 5686.

Main Topics:

Topics covered include: household composition and relationships, housing tenure, nationality, ethnicity and residential history, employment and training (including government schemes), workplace and location, job hunting, educational background and qualifications. Many of the variables included in the survey are the same as those in the LFS.

Coverage:

Dates of Fieldwork: January 2006 - December 2006
Country: United Kingdom
Spatial Units: Government Office Regions (GORs)
Observation Units: Individuals
Kind of Data: Numeric data; Individual (micro) level

Universe Sampled:

Location of Units of Observation: National
Population: Persons resident in the UK in private households, and young people living away from the parental home in student halls of residence or similar institutions during term time.

Methodology:

Time Dimensions: Repeated cross-sectional study
The survey has a panel element, in that the households at selected addresses are interviewed annually over four waves, in the same way as for the LFS boosts. They then leave the survey and are replaced by other households.
Sampling Procedures: Multi-stage stratified random sample
Method of Data Collection: Face-to-face interview; Telephone interview
Data Sources: See the 'Abstract' section above for details of sources used.
Weighting: For later studies in the series, due to the removal of APS(B) cases, there is now a single weighting variable, PW06, for use with all variables. The weight has been rounded to be integer, in line with the LFS.

Language(s) of Written Materials:

Study Description: English
Study Documentation: English

Access:

Access Conditions: The depositor has specified that registration is required and standard conditions of use apply. The depositor may be informed about usage. See terms and conditions for further information.
Availability: ESDS Government, UK Data Archive
Contact: Help desk: govsurveys@esds.ac.uk

Date of First Release:

10 September 2007

Copyright:

Crown copyright material is reproduced with the permission of the Controller of HMSO and the Queen’s Printer for Scotland

File last updated:

4 December 2009