1. Meeting Of The European Directors of Social Statistics
COMMISSION IMPLEMENTING REGULATION (EU) implementing Regulation (EC) No 763/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council on population and housing censuses, as regards the modalities and structure of the quality reports and the technical format for data transmission and amending Regulation (EU) No 1151/2010 Item 3.1 of the draft agenda
Meeting Of The European Directors of Social Statistics
Luxembourg, 4-5 October 2016

2. Background
The 2021 EU census data collection based on the existing European Parliament and Council Regulation (EC) 763/2008 (the legal basis for the 2011 data collection)
Legal acts for the 2021 census in place by 2017
Two implementing regulations setting the reference year and data and metadata programme, and providing the definitions of census topics and their breakdowns for the 2021 data collection, were supported by the DSS at its February 2016 meeting and adopted by the ESS Committee in September 2016.

3. A third implementing regulation – presented here defines the quality reports and the technical format for data transmission
The provision of quantitative metadata follows the requirements of Article 6 of Regulation (EC) 763/2008, in particular paragraph 2:
Member States shall provide the Commission (Eurostat) with a report on the quality of the data transmitted. In this context, Member States shall report on the extent to which the chosen data sources and methodology meet the essential features of population and housing censuses as defined in Article 2(i).

4. Process 2 meetings of the Task Force and 1 Working Group consultation
The Working Group approved the draft regulation in April 2016
It was agreed that the Working Group would also have the opportunity to make any further detailed comments on the draft regulation in writing during May 2016.
No substantive comments were received.

5. Principles
Similar approach has been adopted to that applied to the earlier two implementing regulations :
an overall simplification with a focus on those aspects of the data collection that are of greatest interest to users;
the removal of optional categories;
relevance – updating to reflect new data needs, changing priorities in society;
taking into account the experience gained in the census round.

6. Changes from 2011 census
2021 – only 2 comprehensive quality hypercubes based on Eurostat need to assess quality (2011  35 = 21 compulsory + 14 optional).
focuses only on data on persons (excluding the quantitative metadata on households, families and dwellings that were included as optional in 2011);
concerns the national level only (rather than NUTS2 as in 2011)
concerns only the census topics that are most relevant to users.

7. Format for data transmission
Census Hub procedures and infrastructure developed for the 2011 data collection should be re-used for 2021.
This approach maximises the value of the resources invested by NSIs and Eurostat into the Census Hub, and is expected to pose the least burden on NSIs during the preparations for 2021.
Article 6 of the draft regulation refers directly to the use of the Census Hub as part of the implementation of SDMX.

8. Extension to the storage and availability of 2011 data
Under the Regulation (EU) No 1151/2010, the 2011 census data are to be retained by NSIs until 1 January 2025, allowing the continued operation of the Census Hub until this date.
Agreed to keep the 2011 data, allowing comparisons where possible with the 2021 data.
Article 7 of the draft regulation therefore amends Regulation (EU) No 1151/2010 so that the 2011 data are to be kept available until 1 January 2035 – the same date set for the 2021 data.

9. The members of the DSS are invited to:
Note the process and principles that have been followed in preparing these proposals
Support and provide comments on the draft implementing regulation, including the proposals for quantitative metadata for quality reports, for the data transmission format and for the date until which the data and metadata should be retained.