TRE Communities Conference 16 - 18 November 2026

The annual event is the only time this community meets in person. It’s grown from an informal meeting of 30 to an annual, multi-day event.
About this Event

The 2026 TRE Communities Conference will be held on Monday 16 – Wednesday 18 November. The venue will be the DoubleTree Hilton City Centre in Edinburgh.

This annual event is the only time this community meets in person. It’s grown from an informal meeting of 30 people to an annual, multi-day conference with over 100 in person attendees

The event will run from midday on Monday to midday on Wednesday. DARE UK are generously funding the three-day conference (including all lunches and refreshments), and Research Data Scotland are generously funding an evening reception.

The event will be in-person, but we are open to running some sessions hybrid if we can find volunteers to organise this. If so, please contact the organising committee via email:

[email protected]

Provisional programme (draft)

Plenary sessions:

• The DEA, UKSA and the accreditation of TREs
• DARE and TREvolution
• Earning trust, not assuming it (PIE session)
• Responsible AI in TREs

Parallel sessions

• Non-technical problems: overcoming the practical challenges of data federation
• Governance in Practice for Sensitive Data Access: Lessons from Safe Text and Synthetic Data Communities
• Shapes and Patterns of Federation
• Writing, Agreeing and Living by a Rulebook in a Federated Ecosystem
• Harmonising policies on decision making on what can and cannot be used in a TRE.
• How do we FAIRify data that can't be shared? Metadata approaches for TREs
• International Access – a case study of developing principles of safe access
• Building Capacity and Driving Impact in Administrative Data Research: Practical Lessons from Coordinated Support and Infrastructure

Registration will open in September. There is no conference fee but numbers may be limited by organisation. Public representatives can apply to have travel and accommodation costs covered - these will be considered on a case by case basis. Please submit your details when prompted on the booking form.

We are currently seeking additional sponsors for a second evening reception or to sponsor light pastry breakfasts on Tuesday and Wednesday. If you know of an organisation that would be keen to sponsor part of the event, please contact: [email protected]

If you wish to join the Sensitive Data Skills Summit on Monday morning - please choose this option on the booking page.

We look forward to seeing as many of you as we can in November!