Statistics: Accuracy

Lord Forsyth of Drumlean Excerpts

Monday 1st July 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham]

Under the Ministerial Code, if a Minister misleads the House, he or she is obliged to put it right. So far as Ministers doing the right thing, a year ago the Home Secretary resigned after inadvertently misleading the House. I say in passing that when it comes to the creative use of figures, none of us can lay a glove on the Liberal Democrats, with their use of bar charts—“Only the Lib Dems can win here”. These multicoloured instruments of fantasy now have a website all of their own on Buzzfeed.

[Lord Forsyth of Drumlean (Con)]

My Lords, does my noble friend not think it wrong that the official statistics body has openly admitted that there is an error in the retail prices index which results in commuters, students and other groups being short-changed? Should not a body responsible for the integrity of our statistics resile from its current position, where it refuses to adjust the error?

[Lord Young of Cookham]

My noble friend tempts me to reach for my folder which has a 20-minute speech in response to his debate, which is shortly to begin, on the use of the retail prices index and the role of the UK Statistics Authority. If he can contain himself until then, he will get a very full reply.