In March 2025, an updated Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the CSO and Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (DCEDIY) was co-signed by Jennifer Banim (Director General, CSO) and Kevin McCarthy (Secretary General, DCEDIY).
The purpose of this MoU is to clarify the roles and responsibilities of, as well as the areas of cooperation between, CSO and DCEDIY with regard to GUI. It sets out the roles and responsibilities of each party, describes the legal basis for the on-going operation of GUI, and describes the governance and operational arrangements for GUI from 1 January 2023, under the new partnership model, for the three cohorts (Cohort ‘98, Cohort ’08, and Cohort ‘24).
In March 2023, an updated Memorandum Of Understanding between the CSO and DCEDIY on GUI (PDF 359KB) was co-signed by Pádraig Dalton (Director General, CSO) and Kevin McCarthy (Secretary General, DCEDIY).
The purpose of this MoU is to clarify the roles and responsibilities of, as well as the areas of cooperation between, CSO and DCEDIY with regard to GUI. It sets out the roles and responsibilities of each party, describes the legal basis for the on-going operation of GUI, and describes the governance and operational arrangements for GUI from 1 January 2023, under the new partnership model, for the existing cohorts (Cohort 98 and Cohort 08) and for the new birth cohort (Cohort 24). This MoU also sets out a shared understanding of the parties in relation to data protection issues that may arise and roles relating to the compilation, transfer and use of this data. The processing of personal data of data subjects is governed by the Statistics Act, 1993 and the Data Protection Acts 1988-2018 and the General Data Protection Regulation.
Following a Government decision in 2019 (S180/20/10/0528) to develop plans for the continuation of GUI and provide a stable and sustainable future for the study, a new partnership approach to the implementation of GUI has been developed. Under this new model the CSO are conducting the GUI survey as part of their household survey programme, and DCEDIY continues to be the study sponsor and to undertake key aspects of the GUI study including the identification of research needs, stakeholder engagement, capacity building, a research programme and knowledge transfer activities.