Amalgamating the Cross-Section and Panel Samples in WERS 2011: Report of a Scoping Study

The Workplace Employment Relations Survey (WERS) has traditionally included both a cross-section survey and a two-wave panel survey. The cross-sectional survey provides a snapshot of employment relations within a representative sample of the population of workplaces in existence at the time. The panel survey takes the previous cross-section as its first wave and, for its second wave, seeks to trace all of those workplaces and to re-interview a sub-sample of in-scope survivors, thereby providing data on the incidence and nature of within-workplace change. All of those workplaces from the current cross-section which were also in scope for the previous cross-section (so-called Ôcontinuing workplaces') necessarily form part of the population for wave two of the panel survey. As a result there is inevitably some duplication of effort. Indeed, a duplication of effort is ensured by the survey design since the samples for the new cross-section and wave two of the panel are forced to be independent. This report outlines the findings of a scoping study, commissioned by the Department for Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) and the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (Acas), to assess the feasibility of amalgamating the cross-section and panel survey samples in WERS6. In summary, the report concludes that the amalgamation of the two samples is technically feasible, but that it will introduce some considerable complexity into the procedures for sampling and weighting. The approach is therefore accompanied by a degree of risk, but the report suggests some measures to reduce these risks. These risks must also be weighed by the survey sponsors against the potential cost savings, which are substantial.