Equality Data Improvement Programme project board - highlight report: April 2025

Project name: Equality Data Improvement Programme (EDIP)
Senior Responsible Officer: Mick Wilson, Head of Communities Analysis Division
Project Manager: Beth Cocker /Molly Halligan
Next project meeting: 06/05/2025
Period covering: 07/04/2025-28/04/2025
Report date: 29/04/2025
RAG last period: Green
RAG this period: Green

Summary of overall progress 

Analysts across the Scottish Government and NRS are continuing to progress the agreed equality data improvement actions, set until the end of 2025. Action leads provided an update on progress in April 2025.

Of the 45 actions in the strategy:

• 16 are complete, in the previous Jan 2025 progress update 13 were complete
• 21 are on course, in the previous Jan 2025 progress update 24 were on course
• 6 are delayed, in the previous Jan 2025 progress update 6 were delayed
• 0 are not yet started, in the previous Jan 2025 progress update 0 were not yet started
• 2 are no longer feasible, in the previous Jan 2025 progress update 2 were no longer feasible (EDIP Board approval is required)

Project achievements for this period

Action 24

Run workshops and seminars for public sector attendees to showcase best practice in collecting, analysing and presenting equality evidence. The Equality Analysis Team have conducted a number of sessions for internal and external colleagues promoting good practice around gathering and analysing evidence. The team are now creating recordings of previous presentations covering best practice for equality evidence to share with internal SG colleagues. Ad-hoc presentations or learning sessions will continue to be developed when and as required.

Action 43

The planning and delivery of Scotland’s 2022 Census. Standard census data has now been published for all topics down to the lowest level of geographies where possible.

Action 45

The feasibility and utility of collecting more granular data on households with disabled adults from council tax billing systems. The feasibility and utility has now been assessed and collecting more granular data within this dataset is not possible. This action is therefore judged to have been completed, and going forward analysis efforts will be refocussed on exploring the data now available from the 2022 Census on households with people with a limiting health problem or disability and/or with specific long-term health conditions.

Delayed milestones and tasks

Actions 1 and 2

Development of disability data is being explored in the context of child protection Joint Investigative Interview data, in work being led by CELCIS. Learning from this will be considered and applied in future updates to Child Protection and Looked After Children datasets.

Actions 28 and 30

Previously marked as ‘not yet started’, these actions relate to Health and Social Care improving response rates which includes developing an easier system to input data year round, as well as plans to explore how links can be made to NPCCD for smoother data collection. The new approach aims to be in place for in-hours in 2024 and out-of-hours by 2025 onwards. A working group for the 2024 survey discussed the collection of more equality data, but suggested the surveys were not the best approach as individuals do not have access to their own data. Other approaches to obtain this data are now being considered.

Action 31

Previously marked as ‘not yet started’, this action relates to improvements to equality data for Core Dataset for Tier 2 and Tier 3 Weight Management Services for Children/Young People and Adults in Scotland. The team are reviewing this dataset with PHS and exploring what progress can be made in light of resourcing issues.

Action 44

Achieving the broader aim of improving the availability of ethnicity data for our mortality statistics is still on the team’s long term aims but due to the change from in-person registrations to online and limitations on resource within the team, means progress has been delayed and it is likely it won’t be achieved by the end of 2025.

Plans for the next period

• the Equality Analysis Team will progress plans for the ‘Equality Evidence Strategy Roadshows’
• action 3 - the next Growing Up in Scotland report (Sweep 11) should be published summer 2025. This will include analysis by SIMD, disability and sex

Key risks

Risk no. 1

Some actions within the Equality Evidence Strategy are not taken forward by analysts, for example some action leads have indicated that their completion date will go beyond 2025 due to lack of available data.
Severity (1-5): 4 
Probability (1-5): 2
Actions: Equality Analysis Team has gained buy-in from a network of analysts to help drive the work forward and continue to monitor progress. The EDIP programme also has senior buy in from ALG, along with the Chief Statistician and Chief Social Researcher.

The Interim Review (2024) suggested a next step of offering individual meetings with action leads to identify which programmes of work require more support and how this can be done. This includes thinking about how to encourage and support action leads increasing policy engagement with their actions to extend wider impact over the course of the Strategy’s final year.
Impact of Actions on Risks: Regular review of actions ensuring progress and relevance.

Risk no. 2

Staff changes within project board and network leads responsible for actions

Severity (1-5): 1
Probability (1-5): 3
Actions: The Interim Review (2024) concluded that regular communication will be maintained and a handover note will be developed for any new members to the EDIP board and analysts taking over actions to ensure better understanding of the Strategy and EDIP.
Impact of Actions on Risks: Project Board are more informed of EDIPs progress to date. Analytical network leads are able to take actions forward and maintain progress updates. 

Project RAG status key

Red: some risks/issues require immediate attention from the Programme Manager/Challenge Owner/Lead
Amber: some risks/issues are self contained within tolerances
Green: project is proceeding on schedule