On 2nd April 2020, the Government announced that the Unique Property Reference Number (UPRN) and Unique Street Reference Number (USRN) will be released under an Open Government Licence (OGL). Additionally, the Government Digital Service has mandated that the UPRN and USRN are to be the public sector standard for referencing and sharing property and street information.
Minister for Housing Rt Hon Christopher Pincher said:
"I am delighted by today's announcement and encouraged by the new opportunities this presents to digitally transform public services and boost our economy.
"This is the most powerful boost for the UK PropTech sector in a generation, unlocking new levels of digital innovation on a national scale. Open identifiers are crucial for tech entrepreneurs and wider industry – they will enable housing developers to find sites that have the most potential, helping deliver much-needed new homes across the country.
"This is an important milestone in the Government's commitment to maximising the value of geospatial data."
Over the past two years, GeoPlace has worked closely with Ordnance Survey, the Local Government Association, the Improvement Service and the Geospatial Commission to reach an agreement on the opening up of the UPRN and USRN as part of the Public Sector Geospatial Agreement (PSGA).
GeoPlace welcomes the announcement which shows that government acknowledges the importance of having good address and street data available, as this can underpin and secure delivery of the best possible public sector outcomes.
See the GeoPlace announcement at Government investment opens up UPRNs and USRNs for Great Britain and our blog So what are these UPRNs and USRNs that everyone is talking about?
The Digital Land Team at the Ministry and Housing, Communities and Local Government have published their support of the move - Unique property identifiers to be opened under Open Government License.
The data becomes available and the mandate comes into force in July 2020.
Open Identifiers policy
Ordnance Survey have published the Open Identifiers (ID) policy outlining how it makes it easier for third parties to share information and link datasets.
The Open Identifier policy replaces the previous Topographic Identifier (TOID) and Unique Property Reference Number (UPRN) policies with a single, unified policy for all OS identifiers. It applies to these OS products:
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OS MasterMap Topography Layer
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OS MasterMap Sites Layer
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OS MasterMap Highways Network
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OS MasterMap Water Network
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AddressBase
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AddressBase Plus
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AddressBase Premium
See https://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/business-government/tools-support/open-mastermap-programme/open-id-policy for more information.
