Annex C: Strategic risks

Independence, trustworthiness and impact

The risk that, particularly in the heightened political environment leading to an election, the statutory independence of the UK Statistics Authority is, or is perceived to be, compromised by political interests or commercial relationships, and/or the trust in the UKSA is eroded.

Ensuring our statistics and analysis keep pace with changing priorities

The risk that the UKSA is not able to pivot, focus and commit to providing timely and relevant data on the most important questions of the day with agility and pace and/or does not maintain a culture of continuous improvement across the entirety of its outputs. The UKSA fails to continue to meet the demands and needs of our varied users. There is also the risk UKSA do not take opportunities to collaborate on analysis across government, devolved regions, local authorities, data providers and data users.

Delivery of strategic ambition

The risk that the UKSA is unable to ensure that appropriate investment and/or resource is allocated to the key activities that impact on the strategy, and/or is unable to respond with agility to new/emerging priorities.

Quality Statistics

The risk that the quality (and/or perception of quality) of UKSA outputs diminishes, as well as the ability to appropriately communicate changes to quality.

Security

There is an increased risk of an accidental information loss and/or a successful cyber or physical attack resulting in service disruption and/or a data breach.

Our people

The risk that the UKSA is unable to develop, deploy and retain individuals with critical skills and is unable to retain a diverse and inclusive pool of talent. When recruitment is required externally, the UKSA is unable to attract critical skills.

Our communications

The risk that the quality of UKSA communications is poor and uncoordinated. Communications are not open, accessible, coherent and timely. There is a risk that the UKSA is not seen as transparent, data is misunderstood or misused, and the organisation is unable to respond with agility.

Inclusivity in our statistics and analysis

The risk that the UKSA’s presentation of society is not inclusive and reflective of all aspects of the UK’s rapidly changing economy, demographics and policy priorities.

Ability to transform and accurately measure population and migration

The risk that the UKSA fails to: i) accurately produce its core population and migration statistics offering and/or does not deliver the transformation required for it to be fit for the future and to meet user needs; and ii) fails to provide a credible evidence base for the acceptance of the National Statistician’s Recommendation by Parliament.

Data access and usability

The risk that the UKSA may be unable to influence both public and private sectors in delivering transformative data sharing arrangements. Such arrangements are crucial to: i) support UKSA’s role of facilitating increased sharing and linkage of data for research purposes that benefit the public good; and ii) support the UKSA in obtaining regular and sustainable access to administrative data that is useable and of sufficient quality.

Technological resilience

There is a risk that the UKSA technology estate (inc. third party suppliers, software, systems, services and platforms) is unreliable, obsolescent, unaffordable or no longer supported.