Public opinions and social trends, Great Britain: 17 to 28 January 2024

The following information is for the latest survey period 17 to 28 January 2024, based on adults in Great Britain:

• When asked about the important issues facing the UK today, the most commonly reported issues were the cost of living (87%), the NHS (84%), the economy (69%), climate change and the environment (58%), housing (57%) and crime (55%).
• Half of adults (50%) reported that international conflict was an important issue in the latest period; this proportion has gradually increased since October 2023 (34% in the period 20 September to 1 October 2023).
• Around two thirds (69%) reported their health was very good or good in general in the latest period; this proportion appears to have gradually decreased since we first started asking about this over time (77% in the period 20 to 30 March 2020).
• Over 4 in 10 adults (45%) who had tried to contact a GP practice in the past month for themselves or others reported finding it easy or very easy to make contact with their GP practice; this proportion has generally remained relatively similar since we started asking about this in May 2023.
• Around 6 in 10 adults (60%) who had tried to contact a GP practice in the past month for themselves or others reported having a very good or fairly good experience of their GP practice; this proportion has remained relatively similar since we started asking about this in May 2023.
• Around 4 in 10 adults who pay energy bills (41%) reported finding it very or somewhat difficult to afford them; this proportion was at its highest in May 2023 (49% in the period 17 to 29 May 2023) but appears to have slowly decreased since then.
• Around a third of adults who pay rent or mortgage payments (35%) reported finding it very or somewhat difficult to afford them; this proportion was at its highest in summer 2023 (46% in the period 28 June to 9 July 2023) but appears to have slowly decreased since then.

This release contains data and indicators from the Office for National Statistics' (ONS's) Opinions and Lifestyle Survey (OPN).

From the 16 June 2023 release onwards, we made changes that reduced the scope of the release and accompanying datasets. This was based on a routine review of the relevance and usefulness of this release.

Breakdowns by age and sex are no longer provided for fortnightly estimates in the latest Public opinions and social trends, Great Britain datasets. All previous versions of the dataset remain available from this page.

Estimates from the OPN by these and other personal characteristics continue to be provided on a regular basis in other ONS releases. For example, OPN estimates relating to the impact of the cost of living among different sub-groups of the population are provided within the regular Impact of increased cost of living on adults across Great Britain series.

Confidence intervals, as described in our Uncertainty methodology, are provided for all estimates in the datasets. Where changes in results from previous weeks are presented in this release, or comparisons between estimates are made, associated confidence intervals should be used to assess the statistical significance of the differences.

Sampling and weighting

In the latest period (17 to 28 January 2024), we sampled 4,980 households. This sample was randomly selected from people who had previously completed the Labour Market Survey (LMS) or OPN. The responding sample for the latest period contained 2,764 individuals, representing a 56% response rate. A £5 incentive to participate was provided in the latest period.

Survey weights were applied to make estimates representative of the population (based on ONS population estimates). Because of sampling changes in July 2023, some groups in our unweighted sample may be over-represented. Further information on the survey design and quality can be found in our Opinions and Lifestyle Survey Quality and Methodology Information (QMI).

Authors

David Ainslie, Michael Becker, Emily Froud and Tim Vizard, Office for National Statistics.