Earlier this year, following feedback from members, the Royal Economic Society established a working group to explore how best to address two interconnected challenges in the UK’s economic data infrastructure:
The group is undertaking a programme of work to engage collaboratively with the organisations that produce, manage and provide access to UK data.
The TRACE Working Group is chaired by Prof Sir Charlie Bean and brings together representatives from the Royal Economic Society, the Office for National Statistics, the Bank of England, the Royal Statistical Society, ADR UK, the Economic Statistics Centre of Excellence, the Scottish Economic Society, NIESR, the IFS and the Economics Observatory.
At the RES 2026 Annual Conference, a dedicated session chaired by TRACE member Catherine Mann featured James Benford from the Office for National Statistics and Tanya Wilson from the Scottish Economic Society.
The panel explored how improvements to official statistics, administrative data and secure data linkage can strengthen economic research and policymaking. Drawing on perspectives from TRACE and the Office for National Statistics, the discussion examined the challenges facing the UK’s data landscape and the practical steps needed to build a more trusted, accessible and connected data ecosystem.
The HMRC External Engagement team is currently exploring how a wider range of HMRC data could potentially be made available through the Office for National Statistics (ONS) Secure Research Service (SRS).
As part of this work, HMRC is seeking views from current and potential users of HMRC data to better understand research needs and priorities for access. Your feedback will help inform future discussions and planning around the potential availability of HMRC data through the SRS. This is an exploratory exercise, and no decisions have been made about which datasets may become available.
The survey should take approximately 10 minutes to complete and is open to researchers, analysts and others with an interest in using HMRC data for research and analysis.
