Methodological Assurance Review Panel

Bernard Silverman’s statistical research has ranged widely across theoretical, computational and applied aspects of statistics, with collaborations in many areas of science, industry and government.  After an academic career, he was Chief Scientific Adviser to the Home Office from 2010 to 2017.  His current portfolio encompasses research, consultancy, and expert advice, in areas such as modern slavery, security, official statistics, and science and technology for policy, business and government.

Visit Sir Bernard’s personal site.

Dr Oliver Duke-Williams

Oliver Duke-Williams is an Associate Professor in Digital Information Studies at University College London. His research focuses include statistical disclosure control and demographic information capture in the UK. He is currently Acting Service Director for Census at the UK Data Service, and is also a Senior Adviser to the Centre for Longitudinal Study Information and User Support, which facilitates access to the ONS Longitudinal Study.

Read Dr Oliver Duke-Williams’ academic profile.

Nik Lomax is Professor of Population Geography at the University of Leeds and a fellow at the Alan Turing Institute for data science and artificial intelligence. His research includes the estimation and projection of ethnic group populations, small area projections, modelling of migration, and the use of consumer data in demographic research. Nik is co-director of the Consumer Data Research Centre.

Read Prof Nik Lomax’s academic profile.

David Martin is Professor of Geography at the University of Southampton. His research concerns many aspects of spatial population modelling and led to the current system of census output areas and workplace zones used by the Office for National Statistics.  He has previously served as a member of the Economic and Social Research Council and led its Census Programme, and is currently a deputy director of the UK Data Service.

Read Prof David Martin’s academic profile.

Natalie Shlomo is currently Professor of Social Statistics at The University of Manchester, leading research focused on survey statistics and survey methodology. She is the UK principal investigator for several collaborative grants from the 7th Framework Programme and H2020 of the European Union involving research in advancing survey statistics and dissemination. She was also principal investigator for the Leverhulme Trust International Network Grant on Bayesian Adaptive Survey Designs 2015-2018 and an ESRC Research Grant on Theoretical Sampling Design Options for a New UK Birth Cohort 2019.

Read Prof Natalie Shlomo’s academic profile.

Professor Ana Basiri holds a chair position in Geospatial Data Science at the University of Glasgow. She works on developing theoretical and applied solutions that consider missingness, under-representation and biases in data as a useful source of data itself to make inferences about the underlying reasons that caused missingness or bias in the first place. For this, she leads an interdisciplinary team working on “new forms of” data, such as social media and crowdsourced data. Ana is a UKRI Future Leaders Fellow, and the director of the Centre for Data Science and AI.

Read Prof Ana Basiri’s academic profile.

Carl Emmerson is Deputy Director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) and an editor of the annual IFS Green Budget. He is also a member of the Social Security Advisory Committee and the advisory panel of the Office for Budget Responsibility. His recent research has included analysis of the impact of the financial crisis and associated recession, and the Government’s response, on the UK’s public finances. He has examined the effect of UK pension reforms – both state and private – on the public finances, retirement behaviour, labour market mobility, incentives to save and inequality, and has evaluated the large scale pilots of the Education Maintenance Allowance, the Pathways-to-Work reforms to incapacity benefits and the Saving Gateway matched savings vehicle. He previously served as a specialist advisor to the House of Commons Work and Pensions Select Committee.

Read Carl Emmerson’s expert profile.

Version 5.0

March 2025

1. Background

It is good practice, in line with the Code of Practice for official statistics, to ensure that the methods used to produce statistics are the best available and quality is assured through peer review. Therefore, the National Statistician has formed a Methodological Assurance Review Panel to review and provide advice and assurance on methodological matters.

In particular, the panel will focus on some of the significant change programmes where new or revised statistical methods are being introduced or changed, such as the 2023 Recommendation on the future of Population Statistics, the transformation of Household finances and the transformed labour force survey.

Occasionally, ONS carries out deep dive quality reviews as a way of focusing on one area and identifying the risks to quality. The National Statistician may ask the panel to oversee the assurance of these.

These Terms of Reference replace those used previously (2018-2022), which focused on the 2021 Census and 2023 Recommendation on the future of population statistics. The remit of the panel will be reviewed again in 2025.

2. Purpose of the Review Panel

The purpose of the review panel is to:

• Provide external, independent assurance and guidance on the statistical methodology underpinning ONS statistical production and research.
• Identify significant gaps and risks in methods and make suggestions for mitigation.
• Review the methods being developed for major ONS programmes and contribute to their continuous improvement.
• Provide oversight of methodological deep dives which ONS may undertake across its portfolio.

The Chair and other panel members should:

• Be available to attend face-to-face or online review meetings as scheduled, and have preparation time in advance to read papers, compile questions and contribute virtually in between meetings.
• Be independent of the Office for National Statistics throughout the review.

The ONS SRO for the panel is the Director of Methodology and Quality Directorate. The panel will report to, advise and assure the National Statistician.

3. Membership

No single person will have the expertise or experience required to conduct the reviews alone.

The panel will consist of the Chair and up to six other members, selected to give appropriate breadth of experience and expertise. If specific expertise is required for a particular review, additional experts may be co-opted, with agreement by the National Statistician, Chair and the SRO, to take part in discussion and meetings.

There are no formal term limits, but there will be a process of an annual review for members including the Chair. Members may of their own accord stand down from time to time.

Each year ONS will provide a forward work programme and assess the skill set of the committee against that, including plans for succession.

In the event that there is a gap that needs filling, either because a Panel member stands down or because a need has been identified, the recruitment will be in line with the guidance for advisory committee appointments. However, the National Statistician may choose to make an exception to invite a particular individual.

4. Costs

All panel members will be remunerated for their time and reimbursed for their travel and subsistence expenses.

5. Role Description

The panel member skills and expertise should complement each other to ensure coverage of all the topics within scope.

The core panel (plus additional experts, if needed) will need the following experience and expertise:

• General statistical methods used in official statistics – sample survey design and estimation, edit and imputation, statistical modelling, statistical disclosure control
• Demography including Population and socio-demographic estimation
• Economic statistics, including business survey methods
• Questionnaire design, data collection and registers
• Use/analysis of administrative data
• Record linkage
• Combining administrative and survey data/small-area multivariate estimation
• Data Science techniques, including Big Data

6. Review Scope

The focus of the reviews undertaken each year will change dependent on the various programme phases. The review scope will be agreed between the Chair and the ONS SRO, with the ONS SRO having the final say.

The Panel will be invited to review projects throughout their lifecycle, so that early advice can be provided and incorporated into projects. The Panel will be invited to give feedback on recommended methods, including requests for further work or information, and ONS will accommodate these wherever possible. ONS will then decide on the methods to implement given the feedback received.

The panel will not be expected to check any detailed methodology in terms of formulae or implementation. They will provide advice and assurance on the approach, interpretation of results and whether the evidence presented supports the conclusions or recommendations in each review paper.

7. Not In Scope

It will be out of scope to review:

• Detailed ONS operational issues, unless there is a clear tension between these and methodological matters for which ONS require advice.
• Work undertaken within the stakeholder engagement function other than methods for research on public acceptability.
• Work undertaken on similar programmes in Scotland (NRS) and Northern Ireland (NISRA), but review findings will be shared with colleagues in NRS and NISRA.

8. Organisation / Transparency / Confidentiality

MaRAG – The review panel will be closely aligned to the ONS internal Methods and Research Assurance Group which will be the primary source of papers summarising proposed methods.

Each review will be organised internally by the ONS Methodology and Quality directorate. This will include:

• Organising an ‘induction’ briefing session for panel members to introduce the programme and provide an overview of the breadth of work the review will cover
• Setting the agenda for each review meeting, in consultation with the Chair
• Ensuring appropriate papers are provided by areas responsible for each item on the review agenda
• Gaining sign off of papers at MaRAG in advance of each review
• Sending papers to the review panel ahead of the review
• Taking minutes of the panel discussions
• Briefing relevant ONS Directors (and the National Statistician if appropriate) on issues raised
• Monitoring progress on agreed actions from the recommendations made by the review panel
• All communications regarding the panel, the discussions and methods reviewed, by all involved, must be coordinated with ONS

The review panel will compile a report on an annual basis to reflect their findings, which will then be submitted to the National Statistician and published.

Following each meeting, the panel minutes will be published alongside the papers considered by the panel.

The panel will be bound by a confidentiality undertaking, which they will sign as part of their appointment.

Minutes and papers published after November 2019

Meeting minutes and papers published before November 2019

Full list of published papers

Annual Report: 2023 to 2024
Annual Report: 2022 to 2023
Annual Report: 2021 to 2022
Annual Report: 2020 to 2021

Methodological Assurance Review Panel’s comments on proposals for the design of the Transformed Labour Force Survey (Published 10 April 2025)

Methodological Assurance Review Panel’s comments on Labour Force Survey Recovery Plan (Published 10 April 2025)

Labour Market Surveys Academic Review: Report to the Methodological Assurance Review Panel (Published 3 December 2024)