Posted on 20 November 2009 by John Walker
The Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) today launched its latest State of the Nation report and this year’s theme is ‘Low Carbon Infrastructure’. This report provides an interesting take on the low carbon debate coming from within the engineering industry.
As Paul Jowitt, ICE’s President says in his foreword:
“Many of the largest sources of carbon emissions are currently associated with the construction, operation, maintenance and use of infrastructure in particular in the energy, transport, water and waste sectors. Our inquiry suggests that many of the technologies and practices we need to create significant change in these sectors already exist, but their delivery is constrained by unfavourable investment and delivery conditions.”
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Filed under: Data, Environment, Innovation, Low carbon, Sustainable communities, Transport, West Midlands | Tagged: climate change, low carbon, David Kidney MP, DECC, infrastructure, institution of civil engineers | Leave a Comment »
Posted on 18 November 2009 by Russell Hornsey
Filed under: Data, Geographical Information, Maps, Population & Society, Regional Data and Intelligence Network | Tagged: boundaries, data sharing, geographical data, gis, mapping, opendata, ordnance survey, postcodes, statistics, West Midlands | Leave a Comment »
Posted on 17 November 2009 by Stuart Onyeche
Posted on 13 November 2009 by Helena Duignan
Filed under: Economic inclusion, Events, West Midlands | Tagged: age, disability, diversity, diversity week, equality, faith & religion, gender., race & ethnicity, sexual orientation, transgender, West Midlands | Leave a Comment »
Posted on 12 November 2009 by Andrina Dhillon
We’re featured in the first issue of the Analysis of Place newsletter, published quarterly by the Spatial Analysis Unit (SpAU) in Communities and Local Government.
The Spatial Analysis Unit is a multi-disciplinary unit of geographers, economists, statisticians and social reasearchers, and sits within the Analytical Services Directorate. One of the aims of this unit is to promote spatial analysis in government.
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Filed under: Geographical Information, Maps, Regional Data and Intelligence Network, West Midlands Regional Observatory | Tagged: CLG, spatial analysis, Spatial Analysis Unit, SpAu, West Midlands Regional bservatory, WMRO | Leave a Comment »
Posted on 11 November 2009 by Helena Duignan
Latest labour market data published today by the Office for National Statistics shows that the West Midlands’ employment rate has stabilised at 70.0%.
The region’s level of unemployment has fallen by 14,000. However, this seems to be due to people becoming economically inactive rather than entering employment. Previous quarters saw many people in the region moving from economic inactivity to unemployment, mainly due to many of those who were looking after the family or home beginning to look for work, so this could represent a reversal of that trend.
The region’s rate of unemployment has fallen by 0.4% to 10.0%, but is still substantially higher than the England unemployment rate of 7.9%.
The claimant count of those claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance has also stabilised at 186,100, with a slight increase of 800. Read more »
Filed under: Data, Economy & Labour Force, Office for National Statistics, Regional Data and Intelligence Network, West Midlands | Tagged: economy, employment, jobs, labour market, ONS, recession, statistics, unemployment, West Midlands | Leave a Comment »
Posted on 11 November 2009 by Helena Duignan
Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health have announced nine new Centres of Excellence in supporting people who use mental health services into employment, including one in Shropshire.
Services in Central and North West London, Essex, Shropshire, Somerset and South West London have committed to being full partners in the programme. They will act as exemplars of how Individual Placement and Support (IPS) can be implemented in local areas across England. A further four areas have been invited as ‘emerging centres’.
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Filed under: Population & Society, Regional Data and Intelligence Network, Shropshire | Tagged: barriers to work, employment, mental health, Shropshire | Leave a Comment »
Posted on 10 November 2009 by Helena Duignan
Filed under: Population & Society, Regional Data and Intelligence Network, Solihull, Wolverhampton | Tagged: Compact Plus, Compact Week, Local Compact, partnership working, Solihull, Solihull Partnership, third sector, Wolverhampton | Leave a Comment »
Posted on 9 November 2009 by Susana Flores
We’ve published the State of the Region dialogue Challenge or opportunity? How to plan for Climate Change (PDF, 1.3mb).
This report aims to help decision makers understand how climate change will impact on their areas and also give practical ways of adapting to, and taking advantage of, the opportunities and challenges presented by climate change.
The report covers six policy themes:
- Built environment
- Natural resources (water, land use and food)
- Transport
- Health
- Energy and waste
- Business, skills and education
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Filed under: Environment, Low carbon, Research, State of the Region, Sustainable development, Transport, West Midlands, West Midlands Regional Observatory | Tagged: adaptation, climate change, environment, mitigation, State of the Region, West Midlands | Leave a Comment »
Posted on 5 November 2009 by Lauren Amery
They said it would happen and according to research published this week by the West Midlands Cultural Observatory it is happening: the recession has caused consumers to be more selective about what cultural products and services they spend their cash on.
Evidence cited in the latest recession paper suggests that over the Spring and Summer months, people have been saving money on accommodation, but continuing to spend on visits to cultural attractions such as museums, historic houses and visitor attractions when visiting in the region.
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Filed under: Cultural Observatory, Data, Economy & Labour Force, West Midlands, culture | Tagged: Cultural Observatory, cultural sector, leisure, recession, tourism, West Midlands | Leave a Comment »
Posted on 5 November 2009 by martin sullivan
Most of the time we compare the relative performance of the West Midlands to that of other English regions, but how do we compare with other regions in the wider EU?
INNO Metric’s 2006 Regional Innovation Scoreboard (RIS) (PDF, 644kb) made such comparisons, assessing data from over two hundred regions across twenty-five states of the EU to assess their relative performance in innovation. In a few weeks’ time, they will release an updated 2009 edition of the RIS using the latest available data to compare and contrast innovation performance across the EU.
Last Friday, we attended INNO Metric’s validation workshop in London to gain an understanding of the new RIS.
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Filed under: Economy & Labour Force, Events, Innovation, Research, West Midlands, West Midlands Regional Observatory | Tagged: EU, Europe, European Innovation Scoreboard, Innovation | Leave a Comment »
Posted on 4 November 2009 by Susana Flores
A couple of weeks ago I attended ‘Voices from the future 2020: how are we housed?’, an event organised by Sustainability West Midlands.
This is the first event in their ‘Voices from the future 2020′ series which develop themes from the report A low carbon vision for the West Midlands in 2020. The aim of this series is to stimulate thinking amongst decision makers in the West Midlands of the positive future we can have, and how to get there.
The main presentation, delivered by Stellan Fryxell, partner of Tenborn Architects in Stockholm, showed a great example of what a sustainable city looks like.
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Filed under: Environment, Low carbon, Sustainable communities, Sustainable development | Tagged: good practice, low carbon, Stockholm, sustainability, sustainable communities, Sustainable development | Leave a Comment »
Posted on 4 November 2009 by Helena Duignan
No increase in volunteering
New Citizenship Survey data published last week by CLG show volunteering levels have remained almost static over the past year in England.
Levels of formal volunteering at least once a month are unchanged since 2001.
This lack of increase in volunteering despite the rising levels of unemployment seems to confirm what many in the voluntary and community sector have been saying about a lack of funding and capacity to meet increased demand for volunteering opportunities.
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Filed under: Data, Economy & Labour Force, Population & Society, West Midlands | Tagged: Citizenship Survey, volunteering, West Midlands | 1 Comment »
Posted on 2 November 2009 by Naomi Winchurch
Last Thursday, I attended a Census 2011 outputs event. It was hosted by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) in Leicester, and covered a range of Census-related topics.
I’ve highlighted key points from the event in this post.
The biggest proposed change to the Census in 2011, compared to 2001, is to open up access to the data. ONS want to move away from static tables towards dynamic tables, such as data cubes, that allow researchers to interrogate data more.
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Filed under: Office for National Statistics, Population & Society | Tagged: Census, census 2011, census rehearsal, Office for National Statistics, ONS | 1 Comment »
Posted on 28 October 2009 by Oliver Nicholls
The West Midlands’ economy is less productive than the national average, and the gap is growing, according to new research released by the West Midlands Regional Observatory.
In the 2009 ‘State of the Region’ report, the Observatory has revealed that compared to the UK average, the economic output gap of the West Midlands – caused by the region’s lower economic output per head of population – has risen from a figure of £10 billion in 2005 to a current estimate of £15 billion.
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Filed under: Economy & Labour Force, Press release, Research, State of the Region, West Midlands, West Midlands Regional Observatory | Tagged: economy, evidence, output gap, policy, recession, State of the Region, West Midlands | 1 Comment »