The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Robert Neill)
I would like to inform the House that the Government are today announcing they will bring together publicly owned address information for England and Wales from Ordnance Survey and local authorities to create a “national address gazetteer database”, providing one definitive source of accurate spatial address data.
To deliver this, an agreement has been reached to set up a joint venture between Ordnance Survey and the local government group to create a single source of address data. Having just one database will remove duplication and inefficient processes in the public sector and will provide a better quality of information for all users.
The products created from the national address gazetteer database will be made available free at the point of use for all public sector bodies under the centrally funded public sector mapping agreement. Commercial customers will be able to license the data in the same way as they do for the Ordnance Survey and local government products they use today.
The proposal for the national address gazetteer database will be referred to the Office of Fair Trading for third parties to comment. Subject to Office of Fair Trading clearance the database will be developed by April 2011. This will allow the market to review the database before it is released.