1. Anne Vaughan Deputy Secretary Department of Social Protection
NSB Seminar Data as a Public Policy Issue Data as a public good – the DSP experience
Anne Vaughan
Deputy Secretary
Department of Social Protection
25 October 2016

2. DSP Advice on all the underlying policies It’s more than
Mission
Social Inclusion
Participation
Function
Income Support
Activation
Control of Abuse
People
Children
Working Age
Pension
Advice on all the underlying policies
It’s more than
One department or one data holding
Unique identifier PPS No.

3. Administrative data systems
About 50 main schemes with several dozen sub-schemes
Administrative data systems
PPS numbers
Admin & Staffing
Scheme claims
€ paid
€ rates
Event dates
Personal info
PRSI
Financial reporting
Customer info
Millions of individual records covering many years of claims
Not designed to capture coherent longitudinal view of customers’ history with DSP

4. Surveys in DSP Year Type Survey Sample Modality 2015 Compliance
Illness Benefit
1,000 (300)
Inspection (300 medical)
Invalidity Pension
Farm Assist
500
Inspection
Research
Partial Capacity Benefit
Postal
Disability Allowance
12,000
Satisfaction
Jobseeker Satisfaction
100, ,000
SMS/web + phone
2016
Household Benefits Package
Family Income Supplement
600
Carer’s Allowance
800 (300)
State Pension (contributory)
JobBridge
40,000
/web
Back to Work Enterprise
2,000
Self-Employed PRSI survey
20,000
Employer Satisfaction
tbc
General Satisfaction

5. Jobseekers Longitudinal Dataset (JLD)
A rich analytical database consisting of tens of millions of individual episodes of welfare and work since 2004.
Combines DSP, Revenue and SOLAS data to produce uniquely detailed view of the Irish labour market from the height of the economic boom to deep crisis and subsequent recovery.
Moves focus from administrative events to episodes of welfare or work.
At centre of Pathways to Work counterfactual impact evaluations:
Back to Education Allowance and JobBridge already published
Upcoming: Back to Work Enterprise Allowance, JobPath…

6. Public Service Requirements
Better analysis of options
Ex ante
Ex post
Cross cutting
Role of Oireachtas Committees

7. Challenges Resources / Time to work the data Use quant. & qual. data
Document the data holdings

8. Role/Support of CSO Advisory / Methodology / Sampling
Independence / Robustness
Skills Transfer
Close co-op – Labour Market /Policy / SID / IGEES

9. Strategic It’s a marathon not a sprint – need to Invest
Lay the infrastructure