United Kingdom Statistics Authority

Robert Halfon Excerpts

Tuesday 13th December 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

I am grateful for the support of the official Opposition for this appointment, although I wondered whether the hon. Member for Barnsley East (Michael Dugher) was going to declare an interest during his remarks. He might have forgotten—it is a failing of us all, I suppose—but if he looks at the inside cover of the report from which he quoted, he will see that he is still a member of the Public Administration Committee. He has very honourably absented himself ever since he joined Labour’s Front-Bench team, but I hope that he will involve his party in putting forward a new nominee for the Committee, because it would be of great service to the Committee and the House. I make no personal criticism of him whatsoever.

When he appeared before my Committee last week for his pre-appointment hearing, Andrew Dilnot was invited by the hon. Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) to reflect on a statement that he made in 2007 during the passage of the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007. Andrew Dilnot confirmed that he still held the view that he held then: that the passage of the 2007 Act, which set up the UK Statistics Authority, was

“a turning point. It has made possible something that otherwise was not possible, which is the recovery of a sense of independence and integrity for statistics…This Act gives the control and management of statistics back to Parliament…I think that was a very, very important step.”

I shall briefly remind the House of what the 2007 Act did. It established a new authority, now known as the UK Statistics Authority, with the statutory objective

“of promoting and safeguarding the production and publication of official statistics that serve the public good.”

To many of my right hon. and hon. Friends, that might seem rather a dry subject, but the public good in this instance is defined as

“informing the public about social and economic matters”

and

“assisting in the development and evaluation of public policy.”

This is serious stuff. The authority has the statutory duty

“to promote and safeguard the quality of official statistics, good practice in relation to official statistics and the comprehensiveness of official statistics”.

In this respect, “quality” means the “impartiality, accuracy and relevance” of official statistics and their coherence with other official statistics.

[Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way, and for the chance to serve under his chairmanship when approving the appointment as head of the UK Statistics Authority of this excellent candidate. He mentioned the importance of informing the public about statistics. Does he agree that one of the main priorities for Mr Dilnot will be to improve the website to make it accessible to the public, to make it easy for them to use and to allow them to give some feedback on how statistics are presented?

[Mr Jenkin]

I am most grateful to my hon. Friend for raising that point, which he raised in the pre-appointment hearing and to which Andrew Dilnot responded favourably. I think he sees the potential of improving public access to statistics and the public’s ability to understand why they appear as they do, what value they offer and, therefore, how they can influence the democratic process. This goes to the heart of so much of what we do in this place, and the way in which we try to engage our public. Technology, particularly the internet, enables us to do that in an unprecedented way. There is no reason why every citizen cannot have access to the same information that we have—the information that informs the decisions that we make in this Parliament. We should therefore involve the public much more in that. Indeed, we have an obligation to ensure that what the Government and the Opposition say is objective, truthful and properly informative, rather than otherwise; we all know what Disraeli said about damned lies and statistics. We need to ensure that the quality of the numbers and the data that the Government produce genuinely informs the debate, rather than just advancing the partisan interests of those producing them.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Straw]

I have sympathy with the Minister, of course. He happens to be my pair, anyway, so I declare that interest too. I have every sympathy with him, but the forces of darkness get tiring after a while. People always think that the Government will do better if only they can get early information and slip this or that past, but that is all nonsense.

My officials and others used to regard it as slightly tedious that I was not terribly bothered about when the figures were coming out—although I was early on, when I was neurotic about when the crime figures were being released. My view was that one had to ask what the point was of knowing in advance. It just led to a suspicion that we had somehow fiddled the figures because we had had them early and all the rest of it. There was absolutely no point at all. Why not find out at exactly the same time as anybody else? It is impertinent to think that Ministers should have any right to find out in advance. Why should they? They are not Ministers of figures—the figures belong to the public and Parliament. It is also self-defeating, in my opinion.

My advice to the Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General and his colleagues is: chill and defeat the forces of darkness. I am sorry I did not complete that task, notwithstanding being joined by my right hon. Friend the Member for Wentworth and Dearne. Ministers will do themselves an enormous favour if they abandon pre-release notice.

[Robert Halfon]

I agree with much of what the right hon. Gentleman says. Does he not agree, however, that there is a very small case for certain statistics—particularly market-sensitive information—to be released to the Government early, given the effect they might have?

[Mr Straw]

There might be, and there could have been in the days when the Treasury was responsible for setting interest rates. At a time when by all-party agreement the Treasury is no longer responsible for setting interest rates, what can the Government do about it anyway? If they have advance information that there will be a sudden huge—mega—balance of trade deficit then, with a bit of luck, it will gradually emerge through the tax data anyway. What can they do about it? If the markets react adversely, the Bank of England will come in and buy sterling, or not. I accept that there might be a narrow case for examining that, however.

My second point is about the responsibility for defining the components of series. Let us recall the great debate about the components of youth unemployment figures. There was irritation among those in the Government of whom I was a member that that series included people in full-time education, and I gather there is also irritation about that in this Government. Of course, support for the current definition has stayed on the Opposition side of the Chamber. My view is that there is a case for saying that people in full-time education should not be included in the definition of the unemployed because they are not available for work, although they might want a part-time job. There might not be a case for that but, whether or not it is to the advantage of Government, that issue ought to be examined independently and decided independently, without regard to which party might, for the time being, gain partisan advantage.

Lastly, I commend the recommendation of the Public Administration Committee that Mr Andrew Dilnot be appointed as the successor to Sir Michael Scholar. He is brilliant, he has a very fine mind and he has a great understanding of public affairs. I can think of no better successor to Sir Michael Scholar.