PROFILING CENTRAL AND EASTERN EUROPEAN MIGRATION AT THE LOCAL LEVEL

On 1st May 2004, enlargement of the European Union resulted in the inclusion of ten new member states, including the A8 countries -the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, the Slovak Republic and Slovenia. Research suggests that migration from the A8 countries is bringing many benefits to the UK economy, but some local authorities need help to develop a better understanding of the scale and nature of this new migration and the consequences for local service provision.

The aims of this short project are to contribute to a methodology for assessing the scale and characteristics of recent migration to the United Kingdom. The project findings will be used in a toolkit for local authorities, to support policy development in the following ways:

1. identification of the available sources of intelligence and data and assessment of their usefulness and relevance to planning local services;
2. development of guidance on how partners should be sharing data;
3. provision of examples of good practice from three case study areas.