§ Mr. BaronTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what plans he has to change the way statistics related to(a) cancer, (b) neurology, (c) ophthalmology, (d) nursing and (e) midwifery are recorded by the Office For National Statistics. [180202]
§ Ruth KellyThe information requested falls within the responsibility of the National Statistician, who has been asked to reply.
Letter from Len Cook to Mr Baron dated 24 June 2004:
As National Statistician I have been asked to reply to your recent Parliamentary Question on what plans I have to change the way statistics related to (a) cancer, (b) neurology, (c) ophthalmology, (d) nursing and (e) midwifery are recorded by the Office for National Statistics (ONS). (180202)
ONS maintains the National Cancer Registry, which collates information collected by the nine regional cancer registries in England. The way in which cancer data are collected, recorded and validated by regional registries is likely to change as the NHS National Programme for IT (NPfIT) develops. In the longer term changes will follow from the introduction in the NHS of the National Cancer Dataset.
Statistics showing the numbers of people in employment in each occupation are available regularly from the Labour Force Survey (LFS), which is carried out by ONS. This separately identifies figures for opthalmic opticians, nurses and midwives. There are no plans to change the analysis of people in employment from the LFS, although it is planned that the LFS itself will be incorporated in the Continuous Population Survey in 2008. At a later date, it is likely that a new classification of occupations will be introduced.
No other statistics on the topics listed in your question are recorded by ONS, and there are no immediate plans to change this.