A critical examination is undertaken of a new set of data—the 1991 Census of Population samples of anonymised records (SARs)—as an instrument for improving the quality of the indices used in the English Standard Spending Assessments system for the allocation of central government funds to local authorities. The ‘additional education needs' index is used as a case study. Application of the Department of the Environment's existing methodological approach in conjunction with the SARs produces significant improvements in the explanatory power of the regression-based models. It is concluded that the SARs represent an invaluable source of data to supplement or replace the databases currently utilised in the standard spending assessment indices. The implications of this for the 2001 Census of Population are also identified and discussed.
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