The messages Census data have for the business community
The monthly Ink Business Focus with Fiona Scott
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Today is our monthly Ink Business Focus, which takes place on the first Thursday of every month.
The latest information about who we are as a society
By Ink Business Writer Fiona Scott
Let’s take the temperature of Swindon!
I’m not talking about the weather although that would be very apt at the moment.
I’m talking about some ‘cold’ hard facts which I think it’s worth chewing over at a time when it’s easy to be negative about our town.
There are things to be positive about – like the Heart of Swindon project which has so much potential – and things to be negative about like the refusal of our council to engage with Visit Wiltshire and the potential for our hospitality venues to be excluded from any financial wins in the future when it comes to tourism. I’ve written about this previously.
I started working in Swindon in 1991 and moved into my home here six years later, and there’s one thing which has struck me – this town has always moved forward, has always been so economically active, full of wonderful people doing great things even when to the outside world it’s appeared ugly, beige, boring and home to the scariest roundabout in the UK.
And I do say this with some degree of knowledge. I come from the city of Bath, a World Heritage city which is, undoubtedly, beautiful and I know the city very well. Yet if I had a choice, I’d choose Swindon in a flash. We have far more facilities, it’s a cheaper place to live, it’s far more diverse and, in my view, family friendly, it’s not such a traffic nightmare, it has brilliant train services and we are within easy reach of so many other wonderful places.
I’ve also travelled quite a lot in my profession, visiting cities across the world and the UK including Rome, Venice, Verona, Milan, Paris, Oslo, Madrid, New York, Las Vegas, Krakow, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Belfast, Dublin, Brussels and I’ve always felt glad to come home to Swindon.
Now on to stats – and there’s no rocket science to this – I’m not naturally a person who thrives on numbers at all. Yet I’ve been looking at the census data from Swindon (2021 data) and felt it was worth sharing some of the facts with you. This also is data which should inform how our local authority and our local MPs behave in the coming years around decisions to ensure that our town continues to be fit for the future. We must keep moving forward.
One note of caution, the 2021 census was taken during the pandemic and therefore the data itself is littered with reminders of this as it’s felt that this may have skewed people’s answers around various matters. This is just another impact of that seismic societal global event which will see impacts for decades to come.
It may also shine a light on those who moan about our town based on their perception around issues like ethnicity, cultural heritage or religion. Are those ‘moans’ valid in reality?