The UK Statistics Authority has today written to colleagues across the Government Statistical Service (GSS) to set out its new priorities for the statistical system.
The letter, written by Penny Young, Deputy Chair of the UK Statistics Authority Board, formally supersedes the Authority’s five-year strategy, Statistics for the Public Good. The Authority will now work to support the different parts of the statistical system as it refocuses on these new priorities, with Penny leading the Board until the appointment of a new permanent Chair of the Authority to replace Sir Robert Chote, who resigned in September.
In deciding on the right priorities, the Authority Board sought feedback from colleagues across the Office for National Statistics (ONS), Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR), and the wider statistical system, as well as users and producers of official statistics. The letter also draws upon findings from recent independent reviews, and the ongoing inquiry by the House of Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee (PACAC). The Board is grateful to all those who contributed, and especially for the continued hard work and dedication of GSS colleagues to deliver trustworthy, high quality and valuable statistics.
The priorities in the letter will be delivered by the component parts of the statistical system: the GSS, the ONS and the OSR, and will be developed further in their respective business plans and visions.
Uniting all this work across the statistical system is a need for:
- Openness, in engaging with users of statistics, with a willingness to listen and collaborate
- Innovation, where this is a means to better serve our core purpose
- Efficiency, in how we use and share resources and data
- Rigour, with our analysis and assessment grounded in expertise
These values describe how we ought to work. They complement the Code of Practice’s pillars of trustworthiness, quality and value, which set the standards for official statistics to meet.
The Authority will work to promote these values and support all parts of the statistical system in the coming months, as we prepare for the conclusion of PACAC’s Inquiry, and the appointment of a new permanent Chair of the Authority and National Statistician.
The work of the ONS
For the ONS, the UK’s largest producer of official statistics, this letter arrives during a challenging period. The Authority Board is urgently working to restore trust and enable its new leaders to deliver on its new mission statement:
“To deliver trustworthy, independent, high-quality statistics that underpin the UK’s most critical economic and societal decisions and inform the public”.
The ONS will continue to deliver its plans for economic statistics and surveys which are at the heart of the recovery, providing transparent updates to the Board along the way. We have welcomed Darren Tierney to the Board as Permanent Secretary of the ONS and look forward to welcoming the next National Statistician soon. We are grateful to Emma Rourke for her leadership, serving as Acting National Statistician in the interim period.
Steering the statistical system: a conversation with the UK Statistics Authority Board
Penny and non-executive director Mairi Spowage will host a listening session at the upcoming annual GSS Conference on 4 November, to learn about and encourage collaboration among statisticians as they incorporate these values in their work. Visit the conference webpage to find updates on the event.