• The all-island “joint census” is a collaborative piece of research involving work from official statisticians in both NI and RoI, relying on data from the individual censuses in each jurisdiction.
  • Figures from the latest joint census, using data from 2021-22, indicate that 18,318 regularly cross the border for work – 10,541 going from NI to the Republic of Ireland, and 7,777 moving in the opposite direction.
  • The previous joint census used data from 2011 and found that 14,751 people regularly cross the border “for work or study”.
  • While the increase between the two total figures is only 3,567 – which is not over 4,000 – the earlier number included students, so the gap when only considering those travelling for paid work is likely to be larger.
  • Both joint censuses used various statistical methods to make the data between the two individual censuses. For that, and several other reasons, care should be taken when using these figures.

On 24 November, the Assembly debated a motion noting the latest Joint Census publication covering all of Ireland. The motion was tabled by Sinn Féin MLA Emma Sheerin and included the claim that:

“[Over] 18,000 workers travel both ways across the border for work on a daily basis”

During the discussion that followed, Ms Sheerin said:

“One of the key statistics that jumps out from the 2021-22 joint census is the increase from the previous census in cross-border workers. Over 4,000 people have begun working cross-border since the previous census was carried out, and we can see, particularly in the border region, that people go north and south daily for their work.”

There are two aspects to this fact check:

  1. Over 18,000 people on the island of Ireland travel regularly across the border from their home for work, based on the most recent all-island joint census.
  2. This number has increased by over 4,000 since the previous joint census.

There is clear evidence to support the first claim. The second is more complicated, due to a lack of clarity in the data – although the statistical evidence suggests it is accurate, or close to accurate.

The 2021-22 joint census is a collaborative project between the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA) and Ireland’s Central Statistics Office (CSO) that uses data from the two most recent censuses in NI (from 2021) and in Ireland (2022) to produce a single, all-island census.

According to that publication, 18,318 people regularly travel across the border for work – 10,541 going from Northern Ireland to the Republic of Ireland, and 7,777 moving in the opposite direction. This clearly supports the first part of the claim.

However, comparisons between this data and the (only) previous joint census are more tricky. The 2011 all-island census found there were 14,751 regular cross-border commuters – but this includes people travelling for “work or study”.

So, while the difference between the two figures is 3,567, which is not “over 4,000” as in the claim, the change in the number of people travelling only for work is almost certain to be larger than this. It is at least plausible that the second half of Ms Sheerin’s claim is also accurate.

It should be noted that both joint censuses involved a significant amount of work to make the data sets from both individual censuses as compatible and comparable, as possible.

For more information – including details about the significant considerations that should be borne in mind when looking at information in the joint censuses – read on.

  • Source

FactCheckNI contacted Ms Sheerin about these claims but, at the time of writing, she had not responded.

  • Joint census

In July this year, the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA) and Ireland’s Central Statistics Office (CSO) published findings of their own joint census, which combined results from the 2021 Census in Northern Ireland and the 2022 Census in the Republic of Ireland into one all-island report.

The findings covered many areas of demographics, including employment. One such finding was that:

“There were 7,777 people travelling from Ireland to work in Northern Ireland and there were 10,541 people travelling to work in the opposite direction from Northern Ireland to Ireland.”

This means that 18,318 people were found to be regularly travelling across the border for work. This provides evidence to support the first part of the claim.

Note that this data concerns “cross-border workers” and nothing else. This will make comparisons with data in the previous joint census, detailed below, a little tricky.

Further details on this cross-border travels include that:

  • For workers travelling from Northern Ireland to work in Ireland, the top places of origin were Newry, Mourne and Down (3,159), Derry and Strabane (1,966) and Fermanagh and Omagh (1,883).
  • The top three counties in Ireland where cross-border workers were travelling to were Dublin (2,568), Louth (1,850) and Donegal (1,834).
  • The top three counties in Ireland where cross-border workers were living were Donegal (4,049), Monaghan (811) and Louth (720).
  • The top three local government districts that workers from Ireland were travelling to were Derry and Strabane (3,066), Fermanagh and Omagh (1,029) and Newry, Mourne and Down (993).

There are some wrinkles to all this data. The background notes for the 2021-22 joint census outline how the definitions used in employment statistics on both sides of the border are different, although efforts were made to make the data more comparable while compiling the joint census. These differences in data were looked at in some detail in a recent fact check.

  • Previous results

The 2021-22 joint census was not the first such piece of cooperation between NISRA and the CSO. A similar report was produced in June 2014, based on the findings of the NI and Irish censuses of 2011.

The 2011 joint census found that 8,295 people regularly commuted from Ireland to NI “for work or study”, while 6,456 people did the same in the opposite direction – for a total of 14,751 regular cross-border commuters.

This means that there were 3,567 more people regularly commuting across the border in the figures for the latest census compared with the 2011 joint publication.

However, the statistics in the 2021-22 joint census refer to people crossing the border for work. These figures from the 2011 joint census covers “work or study”. This means that the older data concerns a wider group of people so the figures for 2011 are likely to be artificially high when considered as a comparator for the 2021-22 data, which only discusses cross-border employment.

Ms Sheerin claimed that the number of cross-border workers increased by “over 4,000”. It is difficult to say whether this is correct, based on the contents of the two joint censuses, although it seems apparent that the numbers are in a similar ballpark.

The following two maps appear in the 2011 census, showing the origin points and destinations of cross-border commuters travelling in both directions.

Figure 1 – source: 2011 joint census

As with the 2021-22 publication, the appendices to the 2011 joint census highlight differences in official employment statistics in NI and in Ireland, and notes how a similar “conversion exercise” was undertaken to make the two sets of data more comparable.

  • Wider context

There are several reasons to take care when comparing results between these two censuses – and, indeed, when making comparisons between the NI census and the Irish equivalent.

The first issue is timing. The introduction to the 2011 joint census states that:

“The timing of the censuses, just two weeks apart, on 27 March 2011 in Northern Ireland and 10 April 2011 in Ireland, offered a rare opportunity to present a detailed picture of the population of both jurisdictions at a single point in time.”

This is a fair observation. It is important to note, therefore, that the 2021-22 joint census is based on two sets of data that were not taken so close together. The reason for this is that Ireland delayed its 2021 census into 2022 because of the pandemic. 

Furthermore, the impact of the pandemic itself may skew the numbers for both the 2022 Irish census and, in particular, the 2021 NI census in the sense that both sets of population research took place in the middle of an irregular time and so may be less reflective of general demographic trends.

One contributing factor to the rise in the number of people crossing the border for work is likely to be the increase in the number of people. According to the 2021-22 joint census:

“There were almost 2.5 million persons aged 16 and over in the labour force in Ireland in Census 2022 and over 891,000 people in the labour force in Northern Ireland in Census 2021.”

This suggests approximately 3.39m people were in the all-island labour force at the time of the most recent joint census. The 2011 joint census estimates the labour force of NI at that time to be around 870,000, compared with 2.26m in Ireland – for a total of around 3.13m.

Note that the proportional increase here is not as large as the increase in cross-border travel for employment. The total labour force increased by around 8.3% while the number of cross-border travellers went up by 24.2%.