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Bookings are now officially open for the National Rural Conference 2025, which will take place online from Monday 15 to Thursday 18 September.
This is the Rural Services Network’s flagship event of the year, bringing together rural decision-makers, practitioners, and advocates for four days of live, interactive sessions focused on the future of rural communities.
Click here to book!
Member Insight and Analysis
The Member Insight & Analysis section provides Rural Services Network members with tailored analyses of key statistics to assist them and their communities better understand the areas in which they work and live. Select the section that you are interested in to access the latest analyses available, alternatively select the Observatory Archive to access past RSN analyses.
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| The rural economy is as diverse and important to delivering a strong, cohesive community as any economy would be. This section therefore provides important markers as to the state of the economy for our member authorities. | |
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| Balancing the housing market, improving the quality of housing stock, and enabling the provision of affordable housing are all key issues which concern rural local authorities. These are often topical issues and the Housing Insight section considers what the data available can tell us about the position and the challenges that our members face in their communities. | |
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| Where data is available that provides a statistical view of the living or physical environment of local authority members, it will be presented in this section. | |
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| This section takes a look at the indicators of health, wellbeing and social services, each of which are paramount for strong, civilized societies. | |
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| The Department for Education has the vision of providing world-class education, training and care for everyone, whatever their background. In this section we present the statistics that measure the outcome of this vision for our local authority members. | |
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| What does data tell you about the population in your local authority area, and how is it changing? This section looks to provide the insight to answer these questions and to show the situation rurally across England. | |
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| Travel and transport in rural communities can present challenges in accessing education and training, employment, and services. This section presents the data that explores the situation for our member authorities. | |
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Observatory ArchivePast analyses can be accessed here. |
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Rising energy bills and changes the Government is introducing to how we heat our homes means that it is important that local councils know the make-up of their local area and housing stock. The RSN has produced an...
Employment and Support Assessment (ESA) is an income replacement benefit for people below state pension age. If someone has a health condition or di sability, and for that reason are unable to work, ESA offers financial support and personalised help...
This analysis presents the life expectancy by gender at birth in 2020-22. It provides for comparison the life expectancies for the rural-urban classifications. ? Download the Population Life Expectancies analysis here...
Through the answers given to four questions taken from the Annual Population Survey it is possible to gauge levels of life satisfaction, happiness, estimates of the feeling that things in life are worthwhile, and anxiety. This analysis presents this information...
This analysis presents data from the Office for National Statistics showing the Excess Winter Mortality for a chosen local authority for the years 1991/92 to 2020/21. The local authority position is compared to class and classification averages using the excess...
This analysis presents data on housebuilding, permanent dwellings started and completed, as a proportion of the total dwelling stock. The analysis uses source data from the Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government and covers the period 2009/10 to 2023/24. ...
This analysis presents data on housing affordability. Access to affordable housing is a continuing issue and the ratio of house price to earnings continues to be an issue in many communities where local wages do not match the cost of...
The attached analysis presents ONS indicators of the quality of jobs (hours, earnings and contract information) in the UK using earnings data from the Annual Population Survey (APS) from 2018 and now including results from the 2021 APS. The component...
The Office for National Statistics has produced a set of data on migration flow as part of its set of local area migration indicators. This data has been used within the following analysis. Local area migration is important on a...
Economy Insight on the RSN website has now been updated with an analysis examining Jobs Density at local authority level. The density figures represent the ratio of total jobs to population aged 16-64. The analysis covers the period from 2008...
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HOT TOPICS
Amid reduced public spending, fair resource allocation across regions is crucial. Despite a population larger than Greater London, rural areas receive significantly less funding for essential services, even though delivering these services in rural areas is more expensive.
Economic growth is widely acknowledged as essential for national wealth and prosperity and is a priority for political parties. Rural economies, employing millions and home to a higher proportion of small businesses, have potential for growth if barriers are removed.
Rural residents face distinct healthcare challenges, including limited access to transport, longer distances to medical facilities, an aging demographic, housing inadequacies, digital connectivity gaps, and difficulties recruiting health and care workers.
Rural communities are grappling with a severe affordable housing crisis, marked by high house prices, a lack of affordable housing, elevated living costs, and lower incomes, threatening their sustainability and vitality.
Transport is vital for the quality of life and economic health of rural areas, yet it faces challenges such as infrequent public bus services and less Government funding compared to urban regions.
Rural areas, encompassing a substantial portion of England's population and land, play a pivotal role in combating climate change and achieving the net zero target.
In an increasingly digital world, the lack of robust digital infrastructure in rural areas severely limits access to crucial services and stifles economic growth.
A future-focused vision for rural communities involves not just building the right homes in the right places but also ensuring thriving, sustainable communities.
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