Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether ethnicity codes used in the NHS are in line with the (a) 2001 and (b) 2011 Census codes.

The current Information Standard for collection of ‘Ethnic Category’ uses the seventeen classifications set out in the 2001 census, which are available at the following link:

https://www.datadictionary.nhs.uk/attributes/ethnic_category_code_2001.html

The information standard also allows for the collection of a wider range of ethnic classifications. However, as stated in the 2001 Information Standard, ‘these more detailed categories are purely optional and for local use in any way or not at all, provided that any such use does not cut across the national standard.’

The issue of equality monitoring, by reference to ethnicity and the other eight protected characteristics, is being considered at national level under the programme called the Unified Information Standard for Protected Characteristics (UISPC).

Evaluating the use of the 2021 ethnicity census categories is part of this programme. The UISPC Publication Steering Group is reporting to NHS England and the Department this year which will inform a view on the next steps, including any plans for publication and any consultation and implementation timetable.