Welcome to our dedicated consultation and participation area.
Here you can take part in consultations, user engagements, and other participation activities. Sharing your views helps ensure our statistics reflect society, continue to be relevant, and meet users’ needs.
You can find our open and closed participation activities below, or search for a consultation or user engagement activity by keyword or interest. You can also read our responses to closed participation activities by visiting Our response to your feedback.
You can find out more about how we manage your data in our privacy policy.
Thank you for getting involved. Giving your views helps us produce better statistics for the public good.
If you have any questions or comments on the participation activities, please contact the address listed in the overview section of an activity, or external.affairs@ons.gov.uk.
Open participation activities
Standard Occupational Classification 2020 (SOC2020) revision consultation
SOC is a coding framework used to classify people’s occupations within the UK. It assigns all jobs a four-digit code, which is based on the skills and qualifications needed for the job. It is used by the ONS in the UK census and in the production of labour market statistics, as well as being used by other government agencies for their own purposes. For example, UK Visas and Immigration use SOC to grant Skilled Worker visas according to occupational shortages within the UK. Due...
Household Cost Indices user needs
17 December 2025 update Thank you to everyone who has provided feedback on the Household Costs Indices (HCIs). Your responses are helping us shape future improvements to the indices, including how they are presented and published. We are currently reviewing all input and will share updates on next steps when they are available. The engagement remains open, so please continue to share your views. The Household Costs Indices (HCIs) measure the change in consumer prices...
Our response to your feedback
Find out more about what we’ve heard and how that can help inform future plans.
Future of population and migration statistics
On 17 June 2025 the UK Statistics Authority (the Authority), on the advice of the Acting National Statistician, made a recommendation to government on the future of population and migration statistics in England and Wales.
Stakeholder satisfaction survey
We have now published the results of our latest stakeholder satisfaction survey. Our findings show that 92% of respondents consider our statistics to fully or partially meets their needs. The survey also highlighted area for development, including improved website usability and better planning and priortisation of data releases.
Admin-based population estimates
We have now published an update to our user engagement. We plan to enhance our publications by refining statistical bulletins with a greater focus on local-level changes, developing impoved visualisation tools for comparing areas, and creating better signposting to quality and methods information.
Closed participation activities
ONS annual stakeholder satisfaction survey
At the Office for National Statistics (ONS), we are committed to delivering trustworthy, independent, high-quality statistics that underpin the UK’s most critical economic and societal decisions and inform the public. Our annual stakeholder survey aims to understand your satisfaction with and use of our statistics, as well as how effectively we engage and collaborate with you. This survey uses the term ‘statistics’ to include any data, analysis and statistics produced by the ONS....
Government Statistical Service Harmonisation: Consultation on user needs for additional response options in a future ethnicity standard
This consultation is also available in Welsh . 4 March 2026 We have published the evaluation criteria for this consultation on the Government Analysis Function website: Review of the ethnicity harmonised standard: evaluation criteria that will be used for additional response options in the new standard 5 February 2026 This consultation has now closed. Thank you to everyone who took part in this consultation. We will begin analysing the...
Census 2031 topic consultation
This consultation is also available in Welsh . 4 March 2026 From 28 October 2025 to 4 February 2026, we conducted a consultation regarding the topics to be included in Census 2031. The insights collected will shape the development of the census, which will help inform decisions about public services and deepen our understanding of the economy, public health, and inequality. We are pleased to announce that the evaluation criteria , used to assess responses from the...
Past participation activities
Participation activities held before November 2016 can be found on the National Archives.