Citizenship Survey: April - June 2008, England

Summary

The latest national statistics from the Citizenship Survey produced by Communities and Local Government were released on Thursday 16 October.

Statistics from the Citizenship Survey for England and Wales include data covering a range of issues including community cohesion, empowerment, values, racial and religious prejudice and discrimination, volunteering and charitable giving.

Data in the statistical release are based on England, with the exception of the Labour Market Discrimination figures which are based on England and Wales.

The latest statistics report on the first quarter of the 2008-09 survey, covering April to June 2008, and update those previously released on 26 June 2008.

Key statistics from the release include:

• In April-June 2008, 39 per cent of people felt they could influence decisions in their local area, a similar proportion to 2007-08(1) (38 per cent) but lower than in 2001 (44 per cent).
• Twenty three per cent of people felt they could influence decisions affecting Great Britain, higher than in 2007-08 (20 per cent).
• In April-June 2008, 41 per cent of adults volunteered formally at least once in the 12 months prior to interview, with 26 per cent having volunteered formally at least once a month.
• In April-June 2008, 84 per cent of people perceived their community as cohesive, agreeing that their local area is a place where people from different backgrounds get on well together, an increase from 80 per cent in 2003 and 2005.
• Seventy-six per cent of people felt they belonged strongly to their neighbourhood, an increase from 70 per cent in 2003.
• In April-June 2008, 81 per cent of people were satisfied with their local area as a place to live.
• Older people were more likely to be satisfied with their local area than younger people. Levels of satisfaction were highest among those aged 65 years and over (89 per cent) and lowest among those aged 25-34 years (77 per cent).
• Overall, 82 per cent of people mixed socially at least once a month with people from different ethnic or religious backgrounds, either at work, at a place of education, through a leisure activity, at a place or worship, at the shops or through volunteering(2). This has increased since 2007-08 (80 per cent) when it was first measured.
• In April-June 2008 less than 1 in 10 people (9 per cent) said that racial or religious harassment was a very big or fairly big problem in their local area (unchanged from 2007-08).
• A higher proportion of people from minority ethnic groups (20 per cent) thought that racial or religious harassment was a problem compared to White people (8 per cent).
• Eight per cent of people from minority ethnic groups who have been refused a job felt that it was for reasons of race compared to two per cent of White people. Seven per cent of people from minority ethnic backgrounds felt they had experienced discrimination on the grounds of their race when seeking promotion.

The full Citizenship Survey Statistical Release and the accompanying tables are available to download below.

Notes

1. The Citizenship Survey, run by NatCen on behalf of the Cohesion Research Unit within Communities and Local Government, is a household survey covering a representative core sample of 10,000 adults in England and Wales each year. There is also a minority ethnic boost sample of 5,000 to ensure that the views of these groups are robustly represented. 

2. The data are collected through face-to-face interviews. The Citizenship Survey was first carried out in 2001. Since 2007, the survey has moved to a continuous design, allowing the provision of headline findings on a quarterly basis. This statistical release is based on the first quarter of data from the 2008-09 survey (April-June 2008), which is made up of 2403 core interviews and an additional 1437 interviews with people from minority ethnic groups.

3. The statistics relating to racial discrimination refer to England and Wales, whereas those relating to cohesion, empowerment and volunteering relate to England only. This reflects the coverage of policy responsibilities.

4. The statistics from the Citizenship Survey are produced to high professional standards, as set out in the National Statistics Code of Practice. For more information on National Statistics see: www.statistics.gov.uk (external link).

Endnotes

(1) All percentages for 2007-08 cover the year 1 April 2007 to 31 March 2008 and have smaller confidence intervals than the latest quarterly data due to the larger sample size on which they are based.

(2) Respondents are asked how many times they have mixed socially with people from different ethnic and religious groups to themselves in different areas of their lives. Mixing socially is defined as "mixing with people on a personal level by having informal conversations with them at, for example, the shops, your work or a child's school, as well as meeting up with people to socialise". However, it excludes "situations where you've interacted with people solely for work or business, for example just to buy something."

Download

• Citizenship Survey: April - June 2008, England PDF, 609 kb , 42 pages