| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
6.14 pm
Mr. Edward Davey (Kingston and Surbiton): I, too, welcome the Minister to the Treasury Bench. I look forward to our debate today and debates over next year's Finance Bill. I am sure that she looks forward to that as much as I do.
I congratulate the Treasury Committee on its work and its report. I also congratulate the right hon. Member for Fareham (Sir P. Lloyd) and the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, Central (Mr. Cousins) on their speeches, although I felt that they did not do full justice to their report. In many ways, I felt, they hid their feelings of disappointment about the White Paper. They were critical of it, but pulled their punches.
I had the privilege of speaking today to the president of the Royal Statistical Society, which is incredibly disappointed by the White Paper. The society was
encouraged by the Green Paper and the Government's consultation process. It agreed with many of the Treasury Committee's recommendations. However, it feels that the Government have let the side down in the White Paper, the last-minute publication of which seems to reflect a new Government attitude. The society fears that the Government will not be as open and transparent as they had implied during consultation and that they will not deliver on their promises.
We have seen the same happen before under the present Government. They promise a sea change and a modernisation of the whole approach to the government of the country. However, when they try to deliver, they fail significantly to do so. The White Paper is another example of that.
The society would make two major points if it could speak to the House. First, it is concerned about the scope of statistics that will fall to the statistics commission. The commission is to be given control of national statistics, but not of other statistics produced by Departments. Decisions about whether the commission should have access to information will, as the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, Central said, be taken by Ministers. He called that a right to block, and I believe that that position is unfortunate.
The second key weakness of the White Paper is that there will be no legislative framework. The hon. Gentleman said that the Government remained open-minded about that, but it is noticeable that they will remain open-minded until after the next general election as they do not promise legislation before it. It would be nice to have an independent statistics commission before then to judge the Government on their election pledges last time round. We could see whether the statistics that the Government are producing on hospital waiting lists and class sizes are correct, and judge whether the pledges have been kept. The House and the country would feel more confident about all the statistics the Government publish if the figures came from a statistics commission. The failure to legislate is a great weakness.
I want to link those two points to the Government's failure on freedom of information. Citizens and Parliament will not know what statistics and what factual information lie behind the Government's policies. They will have no access to that information under the draft Freedom of Information Bill, even after the changes announced during the summer recess. The blanket exemption will apply to statistics, and that is much to be regretted.
On the detail on the scope of statistics to come under the commission, the Treasury Committee's first report stated, at paragraph 13, that
The Royal Statistical Society, in a press release yesterday,
Other models were debated during the process, such as the Select Committee model, whereby it would be up to the commission to decide what statistics it shouldhave access to. One might have considered a purchaser-provider split, with Government Departments purchasing statistics from a commission that was in charge of all national statistics, which were defined as covering everything. The Government should study those models. I hope that the Economic Secretary will tell us that this is not the last shot and that the Government will reconsider whether they are prepared to widen the scope of the statistics that will come under the new commission.
The importance of statistics in public policy debate cannot be underestimated. In the Select Committee report, we see how they can be used to make decisions about the allocation of resources and to measure the Government's performance so that we can scrutinise Government properly. In recent years, they have been used to measure the objectives and targets of Government, which is relevant to the debate about waiting lists.
Unless the Government are prepared to ensure in legislation that such statistics, which are crucial to public policy, are made available independently, they will not rebuild the confidence of the British people in the statistics that we debate. Under the previous Government, we had an annual discussion about the unemployment statistics and whether the various definitions were correct, which brought the whole process into disrepute. Many people did not believe that Government when they said that unemployment was coming down. There was a huge argument about which way it was going and about what the real level was. On the one hand, the right hon. Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn) might have put it at 3 million, 4 million or even 5 million, while other politicians put it much lower even than the Government. That brought the whole debate into disrepute and made it rather sterile.
It is so important for the Government to get this matter right. The hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne, Central talked about pensions. He is right; that is a topical debate. As we know, the retail prices index figure for September was low at 1.1 per cent., which means that pensioners who rely on the basic state pension are looking forward to an increase of only 75p a week next April. The important question is whether that is the right inflation measure. Should we use the underlying rate, or should we consider a special pensioner RPI? Those statistics could be made available by a statistics commission. It could give
Parliament public advice about the most appropriate RPI. Pensioners in my constituency will not be terribly happy if the current RPI is used to make the decision.
Deciding the right statistic is also important. We note that the Government have ensured that they will keep total control over such decisions. One might argue that subjectivity is involved when one is commenting on and deciding between different statistics--that that is always subjective and should therefore be a political decision. I believe that if such a decision is based on authoritative advice, the Government can be held far more accountable for it.
When the Government present their information, in particular when it relates to election pledges and key political targets, they are always likely to try to manipulate the figures. I do not think that any of us could say hand on heart that if our party were in government, we would not be up to the same tricks. Of course we would and that is why the Government must try to ensure that independence is enshrined in the system.
Debating statistics in the House is always difficult; the truth is often complex. One isolated statistic can give one picture, but when others relating to it are considered, one can draw a completely different picture. That is why we need the statistics commission to give that sort of high-level advice--commentary, if one likes--when it provides statistics for the Government. Judging from the White Paper, I do not see that sort of role being given to the commission.
There are many other problems, but because of lack of time, I will mention only three. The first is that so much is resting on the document, "The Framework for National Statistics", as the right hon. Member for Fareham pointed out. I have it on authority that the Royal Statistical Society would like to be consulted on that framework document. I hope that the Government will not publish it as soon as possible, as they state in the White Paper. Before it is published, many people, including in the House, should have a chance to have an input. If the Government fail to do that, they will be breaking faith with their previous excellent consultation process.
The second problem is that the accountability proposals in the White Paper should be reviewed. The Government seem to want to ensure that the statistics commission reports to the Treasury. They want to maintain that structure. As the right hon. Member for North Durham (Mr. Radice) said, it is time that we ensured that such bodies report to the House--to Select Committees. If we could develop the informal process of confirmatory systems into a statutorily based system of confirmatory hearings, we could ensure accountability and strengthen the integrity and independence of such commissions.
The third and final problem is that the commission is being given the huge task of auditing, collecting and presenting. According to the White Paper, the commission will be relatively small. Unless it is given serious backing, in terms of both resources and support, it will find that too hard a task. As we approach the census, that is extremely worrying.
"in order to achieve the desired levels of integrity, real and perceived, it will be crucial that the Head of National Statistics or of any statistical commission decides which statistics are included within the scope of National Statistics rather than Ministers, and for the distinction to be strongly enforced."
However, the White Paper, written on the basis of the Committee's recommendations, states at paragraph 4.5 that Ministers will decide whether any changes to the scope of national statistics are appropriate, publishing their response. That has caused consternation among the country's top statisticians.
"expressed its extreme disappointment at the very limited scope of the Government's proposals to guarantee the future integrity of National Statistics. Only the statistics currently produced by the Office for National Statistics will automatically come under the new arrangements."
The society adds:
"National Statistics has been defined much too narrowly."
During my conversation with the president of the society, she said that the narrow definition went against all the soundings that the Government had given during the consultation period. It is her belief that the vast majority of respondents favoured a much broader definition of the statistics that the commission is to control. The Government have not delivered on what they were promising the respondents to that consultation process.
| Next Section
| Index | Home Page |