Statistics and Registration Service Bill

moved Amendment No. 26: 26: Clause 27, page 12, line 23, at end insert— ““( ) The National Statistician shall be the government’s principal advisor on statistics and provide professional leadership to all persons engaged in statistical production and publication.”” The noble Lord said: My Lords, unless I am very much mistaken, the words in the amendment are almost identical to those used by the Minister a moment ago when he described the role of the National Statistician. That being so, there seems to be no reason why the Minister should not agree to the amendment. Why do we think that the amendment should be agreed to? First, because the Bill explicitly states the National Statistician’s position as the board’s principal adviser. If the National Statistician is also the Government’s principal adviser, it seems logical that—as well as referring to the board—you would say so. The second reason relates to the fact that, under the devolved structure that we have in statistics, and particularly with the board now being at a greater arm’s length from government than in the past in order to give it the required independence, there is a danger of a them-and-us situation developing between the National Statistician and his colleagues and statisticians working in individual government departments. This has the potential to be exacerbated where the National Statistician asks for statistics produced by an individual department to be assessed and where the Ministers in that department may be reluctant for that to happen. An antagonistic situation could develop over whether various statistics should be designated as national statistics. In those circumstances, one could imagine Ministers being relatively belligerent about the role of the National Statistician interfering, as they might see it, in what they do. Therefore, it is important to entrench the fact that in all circumstances the National Statistician is required to provide leadership across the piece. I was reassured that the Minister said that that was indeed the role of the National Statistician but, for the reason I have just given, it would be helpful if that role were specified in the Bill. I beg to move.