NISRA Annual Business Plan 2025/26
NISRA Annual Business Plan 2025/26
WE provide trusted official statistics which helps us to understand the economy, population and society of Northern Ireland; independently produced data which help to monitor progress, make decisions and hold government to account; outstanding research to support policy makers and which makes sense of a complex world; modern, empathetic registration services that ARE enabling for our citizens; the census which meets the needs of Northern Ireland; analytical insights from management and real time information systems to guide responsive decision-making in the public good; the survey and data collection infrastructure which provides trusted, reliable insights on life in Northern Ireland; linked datasets which enable cross-cutting, ground-breaking applied research and analysis; analytical support to the data-led design, implementation & evaluation of policy by mobilising the expertise and independence of our analysts and NISRA’s statisticians.
Foreword
Philip Wales
Chief Executive & Registrar General
As Chief Executive of the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency and Registrar General for Northern Ireland, I am pleased to present our Business Plan for 2025/26.
This is an ambitious plan which sets out the work that we will take forward this year to deliver on the vision of our recently published Corporate Plan: Statistics, Analysis, Research & Registration Services to drive decision making for the public good.
Building momentum
NISRA’s performance during 2024/25 provides a strong base on which to build. Over the last twelve months, my teams across NISRA have responded to changes in our context with their characteristic commitment, resilience and professionalism. The return of the Executive, the development of a new Programme for Government (PfG) and the continuation of the financial pressures which we faced in 2023/24 were all important aspects of the NISRA landscape in 2025/26.
In this context, we developed and published a clear and ambitious vision for our statistical, analytical, research and registration services. Our new Corporate Plan identifies the key changes that we need to make to our operating model so we can deliver on our potential and improve outcomes for people living here.
Delivering impactful insights
Using the Corporate Plan as our guide, the Agency delivered a wide range of new outputs and services which can inform policy and public debate in 2024/25.
Among our new products, the Award-winning Programme for Government Well Being Framework was among the highest profile. We released new tourism statistics; new insights were published from the new ‘Encompass’ Health and Social care system; and new administrative-data based estimates of the NI population were delivered.
A new dashboard was developed on the prison population; new analyses were produced in support of the first Climate Action Plan; and new tools were built to monitor road safety and improvements to the planning system.
Alongside these new outputs, we continued to deliver high quality surveys which can throw light on the economy, society and population of Northern Ireland.
Our Central Survey Unit conducted more than 40,000 household interviews; we conducted the first ever Management Practices Survey of Public Sector bodies across the UK; and we worked across the NICS to develop a new Childcare Survey to inform the development of a new Early Years and Childcare Strategy.
Our Census 2021 programme also drew to a close in 2024/25 – marking the end of a decade-long, highly successful data collection which continues to provide key insights for policy makers. A range of groundbreaking new micro-data products were made available in a safe, de-identified manner through our Administrative Data Research (ADR) NI initiative, and we released the NI Longitudinal Study: the first such study developed in the UK using Census 2021 data. In the General Register Office, more than 116,000 certificate requests were processed; and Registrars conducted over 3,800 marriages and handled casework for nearly 3,000 complex cases.
Changing our operating context
As our Annual Report and Accounts for 2024/25 sets out, NISRA also started work on key aspects of our operating context that need to change for us to achieve our potential.
We made significant progress towards modernising our digital infrastructure and analytical capability during 2024/25. The proof of concept common analytical platform, a draft analytical toolkit for all our staff and the publication of a Reproducible Analytical Pipelines (RAP) strategy provide the foundations for new developments in the year to come.
NISRA’s new Dissemination Board made notable strides towards maximising the value of our outputs. We enhanced our website and social media presence, launched the new Local Statistics Explorer and we have continued to prioritise user engagement. Our outputs are now more accessible, engaging, and aligned with the needs of a more diverse range of users as a result.
A new survey transformation strategy, the development of a data vision for NISRA and progress towards a new, online Labour Market Survey marked progress towards our data ambitions during 2024/25. We refreshed the strategic vision for our ADR NI Partnership and initiated work on our bid for a further five years of funding from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). And in the General Register Office, a new Legislative Affairs team developed the first new primary legislation for the Registration service introduced to the Assembly for more than a decade.
For our people – who are our greatest asset – we delivered 19 wellbeing events, conducted new managed moves exercises to support career development, and held regular all-staff updates to maintain engagement and visibility. We also began a comprehensive review of our recruitment and HR policies to ensure they are fit for purpose and aligned with best practice.
Our next steps
Our plan for 2025/26 builds on the momentum we have already achieved.
For the first time, the NISRA Business Plan is specific about how our Agency is responding to the strategic priorities set out in the Programme for Government. It articulates how our teams across the NISRA network will develop new statistics, analysis and research to drive decision making for the public good – ranging from new economic productivity statistics to analysis of demand for Special Educational Needs provision; from new fiscal statistics to analysis of hospital waiting times; from new childcare statistics to analysis of offending and reoffending behaviours. These new, cross-cutting ambitions align our work with the key aims of government, demonstrating how we can use our capabilities to help to design, monitor and then evaluate the impact of policy.
Guided by our new Corporate Plan, our Business Plan sets out the changes we plan intend to make to our operating model in the current year. These stretching goals are designed to help us make progress on our key enabling functions during the year ahead. In particular:
For our People, we will conduct an Agency-wide Skills Audit, to inform the development and roll out of a new Training and Development Plan. We will complete a review of our HR policies, develop a new recruitment plan to maximise the effectiveness of our recruitment activities, and continue to hold staff engagement events to give visibility to our progress and promote best practice.
To secure our legislative footing, we will continue to promote the refreshed Code of Practice for Statistics. We will progress the Deaths, Still Births and Baby loss Bill to stabilise the registration service. We will work to develop a New Baby Loss Certificate Scheme, and we will conduct a review of the legislative landscape for cross-departmental data sharing, with the aim of making recommendations where changes are needed.
To give our people the digital infrastructure they need to perform their jobs effectively, we will explore options for a new analytics platform and pilot a possible solution. We will continue to promote automation in our outputs, and work to strengthen our IT capabilities.
To ensure our outputs are disseminated in a way which maximises their value and reach, we will promote new and more innovative digital products which present our data in more accessible forms. We will roll out a new social media policy and strengthen our branding.
Recognising that we can only deliver on our potential through working in partnerships, we will develop a new cross-departmental forum to progress cross-cutting analytical and data projects, we will engage with our users to understand their need for Census statistics and we will seek a further five year extension of our ADR NI partnership.
Investing in our data assets, we will engage with key data owners to increase the range of administrative data which we can access for statistical purposes; we will complete the development of the new Labour Market Survey, and we will begin development of a new Opinion style survey product to deliver short term data needs.
This will be another important year for NISRA. Our objectives for the year are necessarily ambitious and respond directly to the challenges of our ever-changing context. I look forward to reporting back on our progress.
Philip Wales
Chief Executive & Registrar General
Our organisation and purpose
The Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA), which incorporates the General Register Office (GRO), is an executive agency of the Department of Finance (NI). Our central purpose is to provide trusted and independent insights on life in Northern Ireland.
In delivering on this purpose, NISRA has become the principal source of statistics, analysis and research on the economy, population and society of Northern Ireland. Our outputs support decision makers in government, businesses, academia and among the general public by providing them with the best possible information on which to make important judgements. The statistics, analysis and research we produce enable us to monitor the progress we make towards the shared economic and social ambitions of the people of Northern Ireland.
In government, we produce a wide range of analytical outputs to support policy design, implementation and evaluation: helping to deliver better outcomes for the people of Northern Ireland. We independently monitor progress towards key objectives of the Programme for Government (PfG): supporting the effective operation of critical democratic accountability processes, free from political influence.
NISRA provides these services through a network of people embedded throughout the Northern Ireland Civil Service (NICS) and the public sector more broadly. More than 400 staff work across 24 government departments, executive agencies and arm’s length bodies.
The Agency is directed by the Chief Executive with support from the Senior Management Team and the Agency Board. Our governance arrangements are set out in the NISRA Framework document and our strategic direction is driven by NISRA’s Corporate Plan – Statistics, Analysis, Research & Registration services to drive decision making for the public good.
We work with detailed and sometimes sensitive data within and across departments to identify and then answer key analytical challenges on topics ranging from the economy to the health service, from climate change to education. This increasingly involves important data linkage projects – combining information from different departments to support joined up policy making. We have a high-performing and professional field force numbering more than 200: helping to gather critically important intelligence on life in Northern Ireland.
A core part of NISRA, the GRO is responsible for the administration of marriage and civil partnership law in Northern Ireland, along with the registration of births, deaths, adoptions and gender recognition. GRO is also responsible for the maintenance of registration records and the production of certificates in relation to these events on request. GRO’s activities provide an up to date account of life in Northern Ireland, through the recording of key life events.
Every 10 years NISRA conducts the Census of Population and Housing. The information collected provides detailed insights on our society, and is used widely inside and outside of government. It helps local government, health authorities and other organisations to plan and provide future services, and to allocate resources effectively. Following the release of key statistics from this programme, the data are now feeding into key population estimates and research to support policy making for the future.
The things we do
Our vision
Our vision is to deliver the key statistical, analytical, research and registration services which are needed to improve the lives of the people of Northern Ireland. We want to collect, analyse and publish the key information which users need to make important decisions, to the benefit of the shared economic and social objectives of government in Northern Ireland and the broader public good. Implementing this vision will involve:
Working to modernise our data collection and linkage services to produce the highest quality information possible on the economy, population and society of Northern Ireland: embedding modern, low-cost and high quality data collection processes which promote interoperability between datasets to maximise the potential for analytical insights from linked data.
Being innovative and proactive in our engagement: identifying and meeting user needs for new data and analyses, while continuing to produce trusted, valued statistical outputs, and working to deliver outputs in increasingly accessible, impactful ways.
Working across government and with academics to deliver high quality research outputs which address important questions in support of the Programme for Government.
Continuing to deliver first class registration and genealogical services to our customers, using modern, efficient and secure technologies, consistent with legislation and in line with best practice.
Developing and supporting our people so we can continue to foster an engaged, innovative, diverse workforce who are valued, supported and empowered to develop their careers in NISRA.
Through the delivery of excellent services and outputs, our vision will help NISRA continue to be a proud, confident, modern agency which is recognised for trusted and independent statistics, analysis, research and registration services.
How we will deliver on our vision
To meet these aspirations, our Corporate Plan sets out how we need to change our operations. These changes draw on NISRA’s recent experiences and on national and international best practice. They seek to learn from the proactive, positive responses of the statistical and registration systems to the Covid pandemic, the cost of living crisis arising and the UK’s exit from the European Union.
More broadly, they reflect the way that modern statistics and registration services institutes aspire to work. They draw on our understanding of developments in the UK, Ireland and other international organisations which play a central role in these fields, identifying and adopting best practice in our context.
Strategic enablers
To deliver our vision for statistical, analytical, research and registration services in Northern Ireland, NISRA depends on a range of strategic enablers. These are central aspects of our operating context which govern our ability to deliver services for our users and stakeholders, and which – along with our financial position – determine our capacity for change.
As our most important asset, our diverse People are perhaps the key strategic enabler which help NISRA to deliver on our mandate and advance change. The Corporate Plan sets out our ambition to continue to invest in their advanced skillsets, to maintain and increase their engagement on important policy issues, so that they continue to feel proud to work in NISRA and of the public good which their activities facilitate. It signals our commitment to deliver an enabling digital infrastructure which empowers them to use their skills and capabilities efficiently and effectively.
The change we envisage will also require a renewed strategic approach to our data: how we collect data against a backdrop of falling response rates internationally; how we store, link and make available cross-cutting datasets which are interoperable by design. Our approach to dissemination will also play a key enabling role. We need to continue to address questions identified in dialogue with users and to publish our insights through increasingly accessible, impactful, user-focused methods.
NISRA’s capacity to deliver will also be shaped by our enabling partnerships. Working with analysts, operational services and domain experts across the NICS, the UK and international statistical systems will play a key role. In all this work, we need to ensure we have the right statistical, legislative and public approval to deliver for the people of Northern Ireland.
Governance arrangements
The Chief Executive is the designated Agency Accounting Officer and is responsible to the Finance Minister and accountable to the NI Assembly for the Agency’s use of resources. The Chief Executive is responsible for the propriety and regularity of the Agency’s expenditure and for ensuring that the requirements of Government accounting standards and practice are met.
The Chief Executive ensures that the Agency observes any general guidance issued by DoF and puts into effect any recommendations by the Public Accounts Committee, other Assembly Select Committees or other relevant authority, which the Executive has accepted.
The Agency is subject to external audit by the Comptroller and Auditor General for Northern Ireland in concert with the Agency’s own Audit and Risk Committee (ARC). ARC includes 2 non-executive directors (NEDs) one of whom also acts as Committee Chair. Both NEDs are also members of the DoF ARC, providing considerable continuity of approach and direct oversight of Agency level governance.
The Senior Management Team and Agency Board assist the Chief Executive in the strategic management of the Agency and provide advice on major issues of policy. The NISRA Framework Document sets out further information on the Corporate Governance arrangements.
Partners and ALBs
Nationally the Agency works in partnership with the UK Office for National Statistics, the Office for Statistics Regulation and the Government Statistical Service as well as collaboratively with the lead statisticians in the other regional administrations, and the Republic of Ireland.
Locally the Agency works in partnership with every district council in the delivery of registration services through the Local Council Offices. NISRA considers the various NI business and industry sectors to be some of its most significant stakeholders, given the Agency’s routine engagement with them in gathering economic data. Their views are represented specifically by the Department of Finance’s (DoF) Arm’s Length Body (ALB), the Statistical Advisory Committee (SAC) whose members are Ministerial appointees.
PfG Priorities
Underpinning all of the work NISRA do in supporting the Programme for Government is the PfG Wellbeing Framework, which takes statistics from across the agency and puts them front and centre in the Executive’s decision-making process. NISRA will continue to develop and improve this public facing and transparent showcase for official statistics in Northern Ireland.
| PfG Priorities | Owner | NISRA Contributions to PfG Priorities |
|---|---|---|
| ELMS |
|
| DfE |
| |
| Childcare Team |
|
| DoH |
|
| TEO |
|
| DE |
|
| DfC |
|
| DoJ |
|
| DAERA |
|
| ELMS |
|
| GRO |
|
NISRA business plan 2025/26
The Business Plan sets out our objectives for 2025/26, which are grouped either as the delivery of our core business or under the Strategic Enablers set out in NISRA’s Corporate Plan. NISRA records Performance Measures in the Department of Finance Business Plan shown below, which are also nested within the NISRA objectives. Our objectives are largely formulated as our intended Outcomes for the next twelve months, which includes the Indicators and Performance Measures that we will take towards achieving those Outcomes.
1. Business Delivery
| Indicator | Owner | Measure |
|---|---|---|
| Amend death and still-birth legislation to make the provisions in the Coronavirus Act 2020 permanent. | GRO |
|
| Deliver key civil registration services - births, deaths, marriages, civil partnerships and adoptions. |
| |
| VARS |
| |
| Ensure future user needs for census statistics are understood. | Census |
|
| ||
| Provide high quality statistical information. | ELMS |
|
| VARS |
| |
| Meeting regulatory standards. | SSB |
|
| ||
| ||
| NISRA releases and publications are of high quality. |
| |
| ||
| ||
| Planning and Resource Management | BSDB |
|
| ||
| The Agency will remain within allocated budget. | Accounts BSDB |
|
|
2. Engaged Ambitious Skilled People
| Indicator | Owner | Measure |
|---|---|---|
| Learning and Development supports delivery of business objectives. | BSDB |
|
| People Survey |
| |
| Staff Engagement | BSDB |
|
| ||
| People Survey |
| |
| HR Policies and processes are efficient, effective, inclusive and fair. | BSDB |
|
4. Enabling digital infastructure
| Indicator | Owner | Measure |
|---|---|---|
| Develop a Common Toolkit and pilot a new Analytics Platform. Reproducible Analytical Pipelines (RAP). ICT Team | Strategic Enabler Lead |
|
5. User-focused Dissemination
| Indicator | Owner | Measure |
|---|---|---|
| Promote best practice in dissemination and maximise the positive impact of NISRA’s outputs | Strategic Enabler Lead |
|
6. Purposeful Partnerships
| Indicator | Owner | Measure |
|---|---|---|
| Engagement Models | Strategic Enabler Lead |
|
| Academic Engagement Strategy |
| |
| External Engagement | VARS |
|
| ELMS and Census |
| |
| Strategic Enabler Lead |
| |
| NISRA Customer Survey |
| |
| Strategic Enabler Lead |
| |
| The public is aware of and trusts NISRA. | SSB |
|
7. Strategic Data Assets
| Indicator | Owner | Measure |
|---|---|---|
| Data strategy | Census |
|
| Social survey transformation strategy | CSU |
|
| ELMS |
|
Financial Resources
NISRA’s opening Resource Budget for the financial year (FY) 2025/26 is:
| Opening budget | FY 2025 / 26 (£'m) | FY 2024 / 25 (£'m) |
|---|---|---|
| Salaries | 36.28 | 27.88 |
| General Administrative Expenses | 7.75 | 5.42 |
| Total Operating Expenses | 44.03 | 33.30 |
| Income | (24.33) | (22.30) |
| Net Operating Cash Budget | 19.70 | 11.00 |
| Non-cash | 2.14 | 2.14 |
The opening indicative capital budget allocation is:
| £'m | FY 2025 / 26 | FY 2024 / 25 |
|---|---|---|
| Capital | 2.68 | 3.58 |
Abbreviations
| ADR | Administrative Data Research |
| DAERA | Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs |
| DE | Department of Education |
| DfC | Department for Communities |
| DfE | Department for the Economy |
| DoF | Department of Finance |
| DoH | Department of Health |
| DoJ | Department of Justice |
| ELMS | Economic and Labour Market Statistics |
| ESRC | Economic and Social Research Council |
| GRO | General Register Office |
| NI | Northern Ireland |
| NICS | Northern Ireland Civil Service |
| NISRA | Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency |
| PfG | Programme for Government |
| RAP | Reproducible Analytical Pipelines |
| Tech Lab | Technology and Support Lab |
| TEO | The Executive Office |
| VARS | Vital Statistics and Administrative Research and Support Branch |