On 30th June, ONS announced that it the General Lifestyle Survey (previously the General Household Survey) will be discontinued from January 2012, with some questions transferred to other surveys.

In reponse to consultation, the ONS states:

” ONS welcomes all of the responses received and notes the concerns. These responses will be taken into consideration during the next steps of this project. Given the need to harmonise UK and EU poverty indicators, and ensure efficient data collection, we propose that the GLF ceases to run in its current form from January 2012.
Statistics on Income and Living Conditions required by European law (EU-SILC) will be collected via the Family Resources Survey (FRS) with a standalone survey providing the longitudinal SILC element. GLF questions not covered by EU-SILC will be collected using a separate survey, subject to continued funding for non-EU-SILC variables. Over the next six months, ONS will explore the exact format for this survey to best meet users’ needs. Details will be made available later in the year.”

Full details are available from the ONS website in the ‘Response to the future of the GLF survey consultation’ http://www.ons.gov.uk/about/consultations/closed-consultations/the-future-of-the-glf-survey/