Welsh Economic Statistics User Group, 16 October 2025: minutes

Vanessa Allis (VA), Welsh Government

Jonathan Bonville-Ginn (JBG), Welsh Government

Dan Burley (DN), Welsh Government

Lee Clarke (LC), Cardiff County Council

Rachel Clegg (RC), Carmarthenshire County Council

Julie Davies (JD), Neath Port Talbot County Council

Peter Davies (PD), Senedd

Ciaran Downey (CD), Welsh Government

Lloyd Fisher (LF), Vale of Glamorgan Council

Steph Howarth (SH), Welsh Government

Guto Ifan (GI), Wales Governance Centre

Luned Jones (LJ), Welsh Government

Melanie Jones (MJ), Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University

Geeta Kerai (GK), Office for National Statistics (ONS)

Steve King (SK), City and County of Swansea

Kathleen Mulready (KM), Welsh Government

Jamie Owen (JO), Welsh Government

Jack Price (JP), Wales Centre for Public Policy

Julian Revell (JR), Welsh Government (Treasury)

Megan Williams (MW), Welsh Government

Sam Wilson (SW), Transport for Wales

Speakers

Phillip Davies (PD), ONS

Richard Davies (RD), Welsh Government

Emma Horncastle (EH), Welsh Government 

Matt Hughes (MH), ONS

Sue Leake (SL), Welsh Government

Tom Nicholls (TN), Welsh Government (Chair)

Ian O’Sullivan (IO), ONS

Cerys Ponting (CP), Welsh Government 

Cian Siôn (CS), Welsh Government

Craig Taylor (CT), ONS

Minute taker

Joshua Cruickshank (JC), Welsh Government

Apologies

Dan Burley, Welsh Government

Kate Davies, ONS

Alan Felstead, Cardiff University

Martin Jennings, Senedd

Max Munday, Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University

Adrien Pabst, NIESR

Neil Paull, Welsh Government

Sian Price, Development Bank Wales

Becky Tinsley, Office for National Statistics

TN opened the meeting, welcomed attendees and outlined the agenda.

The presentations will be published online after the meeting (following speakers’ permission).

Simultaneous translation was not provided as the minimum quota of ten percent was not met.

Minutes and actions from the last meeting

TN raised the action from the previous meeting asking for feedback of how input-output tables may be used in the future. CP provided information on PhD project opportunities in a similar area and asked for anyone in academia or with academic contacts to share information about them before the deadline of 19 October 2025.

SL gave a presentation on the Well-being of Wales: 2025 annual report that was published on 7 October 2025. The report is a requirement of the Well-being of Future Generations Act 2015 and outlines the framework of the act. SL shared some key findings of the report and showed slides with some figures the report includes. Finally, SL gave examples of how the report can be used for shaping policy decisions, investment and as performance indicators for frameworks within Welsh Government.

Discussion

TN noted that SH will be interested in peoples feedback on the report; how users engage with the report, what they like about it and what may be not as useful to them. Finally, TN added that the report is now one of the high-profile compendium publications that is produced.

TN gave a presentation with an update on the Wales Economic and Fiscal report 2025, a compendium report published on 14 October 2025. The presentation shared the five essential insights from the report that TN thinks are most important. These insights are published alongside the main report.

Discussion

GI gave praise to the report and comments on the comparison of incomes and consumption in Wales and asked about future analysis on this. TN replied that they looked into this area, but the data was noisy and lacked robustness, so it was not included and instead it was decided to look more into income and relative wealth, noting pensions and property ownership. 

TN added that this is an interesting area and encouraged members to read it themselves and welcomed any of their own thoughts. 

Representatives from ONS gave a series of presentations giving updates on three aspects of their work.

CT presented on the ONS ESP, explaining what it is and why it is important. The ESP was developed in response to stakeholder feedback, an Office for Statistics Regulation review and Devereux Review. The plan gives a hard focus on improving the core statistics, giving resilience and sustainability to systems and reducing risks in different areas. A progress report on the ESP is due to be published in December 2025 and an annual refresh is planned for 2026 Q2. 

Next, PD and IO presented on the IEP. First, PD described the importance of surveys to ONS’ statistics and the current challenges business and social surveys face. The IEP aims to make the surveys more flexible, resilient and adaptable. IO talked through how challenges are being addressed to improve surveys; with increased investment, efforts to recruit and retain interviews, replace legacy technologies and improve citizen relations and responses. 

Finally, MH gave an update on the TLFS. The TLFS had a new short Core survey launched July 2025 focusing on headline labour market requirements. The TLFS Plus survey includes broader socioeconomic data. Data rotation is to be introduced in 2026, so interviewees do not answer repeat questions from previous surveys. The first readiness assessment is scheduled for July 2026. There is an aim to transition the published headline labour market statistics in November 2026, but this may extend to 2027. The Labour Force Survey remains the lead measure for labour market statistics with continued improvements made.

Discussion

CP expressed interest in the ONS plans, noting improvements to another survey they use, and looked forward to sharing the ONS slides with her team. 

TN appreciated the positive changes ONS is making in a very challenging period. 

LJ noted for external users that there are ongoing discussions with ONS on improving Welsh economic statistics. 

PD highlighted opportunities to engage with ONS via the cross-government user group.

RH discussed the launch of  StatsWales3. Publishers gained access to the service on 29 August 2025 and the beta went live on 26 September 2025 with the service running alongside StatsWales2, which will be switched off shortly. The new service has seen a lot of user testing including big datasets with millions of rows, posing some challenges. RH emphasises that the service is designed to evolve with users, feedback and bug reports are welcomed to achieve this. 

EH gave a demonstration of using the external website of the service, showing attendees how to find datasets, view metadata, filter tables and how to submit feedback and bug reports.

Discussion

CD asked about potential upcoming functionality to the service, specifically a search function.

RD replied that they are assessing how users navigate data and to what extent would a search function be implemented such as whether to use keyword, metadata and variable searches.

CD asked if there was going to be a data viewer similar to StatsWales2 as the current service offers no visual hierarchy.

RD noted that this is a very important functionality to users and that they have an approach in mind for pivoting datasets and that this is a priority for the team.

TN encourages attendees to use the service and give detailed feedback to help improve the service.

CS gave a presentation to update on progress with IOTs with outputs published on 15 October 2025 introducing multipliers to the data tables. The published outputs include:

• Data tables with output, GVA and employment multipliers (type I and type II)
• Statistical article with worked examples
• Interactive tool for input-output modelling.

Related links to the published material are available in the slides. CS then outlined future plans for the project. 2022 IOTs are to be published in Spring 2026. The team are keen on feedback and possible improvements from users.

Welcome any questions or feedback to: InputOutputTables@gov.wales or TablauMewnbwnAllbwn@llyw.cymru. 

Discussion

TN expressed interest in the topic and noted that this is a major step forward specifically with caveats as well as the data. TN looks forward to seeing how users may use the multipliers.

CP gave a presentation on the TSW. The slides give information on the TSW, and the updates made during the gap year of the survey. There is a methods review underway alongside experts looking at sampling strengths and weaknesses and how better to handle missing data, ongoing until March 2026. The team is in the phase of awarding a contract to an external provide to undertake cognitive testing for user feedback. A pilot is planned for February 2026 and the main survey for Autumn 2026.

Welcome any questions or feedback to: stats.trade@gov.wales or ystadegau.masnach@llyw.cymru.

TN thanked all presenters and participants.

TN mentioned that the next update of the Welsh Index for Multiple Deprivation 2025 has been pre-announced for publishing on  27 November 2025 and that guidance on what to expect when it is published will be provided two weeks before then.

TN invites colleagues to suggest themes or topics for the next meeting.

The next meeting will take place on 12 March 2026.