Government-commissioned Research

Baroness Hollis of Heigham Excerpts

Wednesday 28th June 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham]

I am sure there is room for progress, but I note that the UK is a world leader on open data and, in 2016, for the third year running, ranked first in the world on the World Wide Web Foundation’s Open Data Barometer.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham (Lab)]

My Lords, we all know of circumstances in which government research has been published after the relevant debate in this House. We all know that government research has been published in the long vacations or vacations where there is no access to it or ability to scrutinise it or interrogate Ministers about it. In other words, delay is effectively suppression in too many fields. Will the Minister please take seriously the very real and pertinent points made by the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, in order to help the House of Lords in its primary function, which is scrutiny?

[Lord Young of Cookham]

I certainly agree that research should be released as soon as possible and it would be wrong to suppress it for political reasons. As I said a moment ago, Sir Stephen said he found no indication that research had been indefinitely suppressed. However, he went on to say that delay could be damaging or unfortunate. The protocol that I referred to gives advice to departments on the timing of the publication of research. I will do what I can to make sure that is adhered to.