CLG: Citizenship Survey Findings

Jenny Robins (27 June 2008  09:46)

Citizenship Survey Headline Findings: April 2007 - March 2008, England and Wales

The latest national statistics from the Citizenship Survey produced by Communities and Local Government were released on Thursday 26 June 2008.

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.

The latest statistics report on all four quarters of the 2007-08 survey, covering April 2007 to March 2008, and update those previously released on 3 April 2008.

Key statistics from the release include:

• Thirty-nine per cent of people engaged in some form of civic participation, such as contacting a local councillor, attending a public meeting or signing a petition at least once in the past year.
• Community Cohesion remains high, with 82 per cent of people in England agreeing that their local area is a place where people from different backgrounds get on well together, an increase from 80 per cent in 2005.
• Eighty-four per cent of people feel they belong strongly to Britain and seventy-five per cent feel they belong strongly to their neighbourhood.
• Eighty per cent of people mix 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(1).
• Seventy-three per cent of all adults had volunteered (formally or informally) at least once in the last 12 months, with 48 per cent having volunteered at least once a month.
• Overall levels of volunteering have not changed since 2001, although they are lower than levels in 2005. Levels of formal volunteering (at least once in the last year) have risen over this period, whilst informal volunteering (at least once in the last year) has fallen.
• The proportion of people from minority ethnic groups who feel that they would be treated worse than other races by at least one of eight public service organisations(2) is lower in 2007-08 (34 per cent) than it was in 2001 (38 per cent).
• Less than 1 in 10 people (9 per cent) say that racial or religious harassment is a problem in their local area, and most of these feel it is a fairly big problem (6 per cent) rather than a very big problem (2 per cent)(3).
  

The full Citizenship Survey Statistical Release and the accompanying tables are available at: Citizenship Survey: April 2007 - March 2008, England and Wales.

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