In February 2014, a Memorandum of Understanding between the CSO and the HEA (PDF 115KB)  was agreed. The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed by John Dunne Head of Administrative Data Center in the CSO, and Vivienne Patterson, Head of the Statistics Section in HEA.

The MoU formally enhances data cooperation between the CSO and the HEA. It also reaffirms the CSO undertaking that all data received from the HEA is treated as strictly confidential and are used for statistical purposes only, in accordance with the Statistics Act, 1993 and also in conformity with the Data Protection acts, 1988-2003.

The adoption of this MoU between the CSO and HEA follows a number of similar agreements between the CSO and other government bodies in recent years. These agreements reflect a realigning of process within the CSO to ensure a more systematic use of the administrative data with statistical potential held by other Government bodies. It is an ongoing corporate goal of the CSO to maximise the use of administrative data for statistical purposes, in order to reduce the overall administrative burden on businesses and generate enhanced statistical output in support of evidence-based policy making.