Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 14 July 2026
59. Deputy Peadar Tóibín asked the Taoiseach the work his Department has undertaken on fine-scale spatial demographic studies to inform policy through high-resolution geolocated population data and GIS analysis. [52692/26]
View answerReferred to CSO for answer
The Central Statistics Office produces census Small Area Population Statistics (SAPS) which is available for eight geographical boundaries. The most detailed statistics are available at neighbourhood level for Census Small Areas which contain 50-200 dwellings. There are 18,919 Small areas in the country and for each area we have published 15 themes of data which include 50 tables and 800 variables of demographic, housing and social economic data. This data can be accessed through our Interactive Mapping Tools. (www.cso.ie/en/census/censusinteractivemaps/) or through data tables at: data.cso.ie/
There are three geographical tools available to access this SAPS data:
• Census Interactive Map
• Census 2022 Urban Profiles on CSO Visual – which shows the small areas in towns
• Ireland’s Census Data Portal on Geohive – enables users to create maps
These applications allow users to find their location of interest by searching for an address/area or by pinpointing a location on the map ensuring the users can create powerful visualisations for statistical and statutory boundaries.
A list of the themes is included below.
Theme 1: Sex, age and marital status
Theme 2: Migration, ethnicity and religion
Theme 3: Irish language
Theme 4: Families
Theme 5: Private households
Theme 6: Housing
Theme 7: Volunteers
Theme 8: Principal status
Theme 9: Social class and socio-economic group
Theme 10: Education
Theme 11: Commuting
Theme 12: Disability, carers and general health
Theme 13: Occupations
Theme 14: Industries
Theme 15: Motor car availability and internet access
The CSO have also published 1km grid population data for Census 2022 data which is available at experience.arcgis.com/experience/b6c68d7e3a70461a82f42a4fb69dc3bd
All the outputs specified above are widely accessible and freely available to all users to inform policy development and other uses.
