The U.K. Office for National Statistics (ONS) published its Nov. 12 update of experimental economic and social indicators, giving readers a fresh view of activity across sectors and household measures.
The release brings together measures reported on daily, weekly and monthly cycles. The ONS says the indicators draw on rapid surveys, newer data sources and methods that remain under testing.
Electricity and gas measures are updated daily. One tracks Great Britain’s System Price for electricity; the other reports the System Average Price of gas traded on the On-the-Day Commodity Market. Both include a rolling seven-day average. Elexon supplies the electricity data, while National Gas Transmission provides the gas figures.
Transport indicators run on different schedules. Weekly shipping figures count visits to and from selected U.K. ports, while daily flight data include services to, from and within the country. A weekly fuel measure estimates automotive fuel demand per average transaction. Monthly vehicle data count new registrations and production in the U.K.
Housing and consumer measures cover home markets, retail visits and rent affordability. Rightmove housing-market insights for Great Britain have weekly and monthly data. Retail-footfall figures also update weekly and monthly, broken down by location category and U.K. region. Weekly counts of Energy Performance Building Certificates (EPCs) cover new and existing homes in England and Wales. The monthly renter-affordability measure tracks rent as a share of gross income for new tenancies across the U.K.; it comes from Dataloft Rental Market Analytics. Dataloft is a PriceHubble company.
The release names exactEarth as the source for shipping data and EUROCONTROL for flight figures. The fuel-demand estimate uses ONS calculations and data from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero. The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) provides vehicle data, and BT Active Intelligence supplies retail-footfall figures. The ONS classifies the listed datasets as official statistics in development.
The update follows the ONS’s Nov. 5 publication of the indicator set, covered in EconoTimes’ earlier report on the indicators. The next release is scheduled for Nov. 19.
