Statistics and Registration Service Bill

As I have stated, we have evidence that a range of important figures currently fall outside the National Statistics system. I refer again to the figure that the Home Office produced and that the Library reported: only 12 per cent. of Home Office statistical output is covered by the current National Statistics system. If we are to secure statistics that are genuinely free from political interference, it is critical to ensure that the reforms encompass not just National Statistics and the Office for National Statistics, but the decentralised statistical activities of different Government Departments. The Statistics Commission agrees that"““the biggest issues are outside the ONS””," and has rightly called on the Government to ensure that the reforms"““address the totality of the system””" or ““risk public confidence in”” departmental"““statistics being reduced rather than enhanced””." The Bill leaves intact the two-tier system between National Statistics and other official figures—a system about which many have expressed concern. Retaining that two-tier system may not bother the Financial Secretary, but it is a matter of concern to the Audit Commission, the Treasury Select Committee, the Statistics Users Forum, the Market Research Society, the Statistics Commission and the First Division Association of senior civil servants. Under the Bill, Ministers will retain the power to decide which statistics from their Departments should go forward for assessment to become part of the National Statistics system and which should not. As the Royal Statistical Society has pointed out, that effectively gives Ministers the job of deciding whether the legislation should apply to them or not. The Treasury Committee concluded that that approach would leave out some of the most frequently quoted data and performance indicators on health, crime, education and the management of public services. For example, as we have already heard from the Liberal Front-Bench spokesman, quarterly NHS waiting lists are national statistics, but monthly ones are not. Figures on sensitive issues such as race and the criminal justice system are not national statistics. Lord Moser described it as ““a very basic flaw”” to have a category of statistics that are ““left totally”” in Ministers’ hands. He said that it was a formula for lack of trust, because anybody who looks can see that the Minister has decided that particular things do not go anywhere near the ONS. Charles Bean, chief economist at the Bank of England, expressed concern that retaining a ministerial veto over which figures could be treated as national statistics appeared"““to run against the broad thrust of the proposals””" to make statistics more independent of the Government.