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Session 2006 - 07 Publications on the internet General Committee Debates Statistics and Registration Service Bill |
Statistics and Registration Service Bill |
The Committee consisted of the following Members:Emily
Commander, Committee
Clerk
†
attended the Committee
Public Bill CommitteeThursday 18 January 2007(Morning)[Sir John Butterfill in the Chair]Statistics and Registration Service BillClause 5Executive
members and other
staff
Amendment
proposed [16 January]: No. 15, in
clause 5, page 3, line 13, after
‘Majesty’, insert
‘on the advice of the
Prime Minister’.—[Mr.
Fallon.]
9
am
Question
again proposed, That the amendment be
made.
No. 120, in
clause 5, page 3, leave out lines 14 and 15
and insert—
‘(b) employed to
operate independently of the Board with scrutiny and oversight of the
role provided by the
Board.’.
No.
188, in
clause 5, page 3, line 15, at
end insert—
‘(2A) No
appointment shall be made under subsection (2) until it has been
approved by the Commission established under section (Establishment of
a Commission for Official
Statistics).’.
No.
189, in
clause 5, page 3, line 15, at
end insert—
‘(2A)
Appointments made under subsection (2) shall be subject to review by
the Commission established under section (Establishment of a Commission
for Official Statistics) within one year of their having been
made.
(2B) The Commission shall
produce a report on any review carried out under subsection (2A) and
shall lay it before each House of
Parliament.’.
No.
16, in
clause 5, page 3, line 19, at
end insert—
‘(3A) The
National Statistician shall have right of direct access to the Prime
Minister on any matter involving dispute with a government
department.’.
No.
151, in
clause 6, page 3, line 34, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
121, in
clause 8, page 4, line 35, at
end insert—
‘(4) The Board
shall have responsibility to monitor and assess the performance of the
National Statistician against the assigned
responsibilities.’.
No.
100, in
clause 9, page 4, line 37, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
101, in
clause 9, page 5, line 2, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
102, in
clause 9, page 5, line 4, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
103, in
clause 18, page 8, line 15, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
104, in
clause 18, page 8, line 17, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No. 105, in
clause 18, page 8, line 19, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
106, in
clause 18, page 8, line 21, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
107, in
clause 18, page 8, line 23, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
108, in
clause 19, page 8, line 26, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
125, in
clause 19, page 8, line 30, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
126, in
clause 19, page 8, line 36, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
109, in
clause 20, page 9, line 11, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
110, in
clause 21, page 9, line 20, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
111, in
clause 22, page 9, line 23, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
112, in
clause 22, page 9, line 25, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
113, in
clause 22, page 9, line 27, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
114, in
clause 23, page 9, line 34, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
115, in
clause 26, page 10, line 34, after
‘Board’ and insert ‘and the National
Statistician’.
No.
116, in
clause 26, page 10, line 35, after
‘Board’ and insert ‘and the National
Statistician’.
No.
197, in
clause 28, page 12, line 6, at
end insert—
‘(d) ensuring
that, where appropriate, official statistics provide evidence of local
variations and service
needs.’.
No.
97, in
clause 28, page 12, line 17, at
end insert—
‘(5) The
National Statistician shall be the government’s chief advisor on
statistics, including, inter alia, matters relating to the planning,
production and quality of official statistics, and shall provide
professional leadership to all persons within government who are
engaged in statistical production and
release.’.
No.
127, in
clause 28, page 12, line 17, at
end insert—
‘(5) The
National Statistician shall be the government’s principal
advisor on statistics and provide professional leadership to all
persons engaged in statistical production and
publication.’.
No.
80, in
clause 29, page 12, line 19, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert
‘executive office
created under the provisions of subsection (5)
below’.
No.
98, in
clause 29, page 12, line 22, at
end insert—
‘(2A) The
National Statistician
shall—
(a) coordinate,
and promote coordination of, statistical production across government
and the devolved administrations;
and
(b) take steps to ensure
consistency in the production of official statistics across the United
Kingdom.’.
No.
29, in
clause 29, page 12, line 27, at
end insert—
‘(3A) The
National Statistician shall have responsibility for
promoting—
(a) the
co-ordination of statistical planning and production across government
departments; and
(b) the
production of statistics that are as consistent as possible across the
United Kingdom.’.
No. 139, in
clause 29, page 12, line 28, leave
out from ‘Board’ to end of line 30 and insert
‘shall monitor the National
Statistician in the exercise of his functions in relation to official
statistics, inlcuding the duty set out in subsection (2A)
above.’.
No.
128, in
clause 29, page 12, line 28, after
‘may’ insert
‘not’.
No.
129, in
clause 29, page 12, line 29, leave
out
‘not’.
No.
117, in
clause 31, page 13, line 26, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
130, in
clause 36, page 14, line 35, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
132, in
clause 36, page 14, line 40, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
133, in
clause 36, page 15, line 4, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
134, in
clause 36, page 15, line 23, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
135, in
clause 36, page 15, line 25, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
136, in
clause 36, page 15, line 27, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
137, in
clause 36, page 15, line 30, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
No.
138, in
clause 36, page 15, line 31, leave
out ‘Board’ and insert ‘National
Statistician’.
Alun
Michael (Cardiff, South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op): I am
grateful for the opportunity to raise an issue that is similar to ones
that I have raised in the past. I seek assurances from the Minister
about the way in which the most basic information on local issues will
be available in the future. Given the direction of travel in the Office
of National Statistics and the discussion about the importance of the
most local information possible, I am calling for something that
follows that direction of travel.
My concern is that it is
possible sometimes for the more local interests to get lost in the
sound and furyof the discussion of national statistics,
international comparisons and the rest. I have suggested that a further
requirement should be added to the role of the National Statistician in
clause 28. The clause states that the National Statistician is to be
the board’s principal adviser on three things: the quality of
official statistics, good practice in relation to official statistics
and the comprehensiveness of official statistics. It is possible to
argue that one could not have good practice in relation to official
statistics without ensuring that they demonstrated evidence of local
variations and that the comprehensiveness of official statistics must
be such as to produce evidence of service needs at the local
level.
My experience
from working in the inner city is that in some areas figures at a ward
or sub-ward level may be insufficiently fine-grained to ensure that
needs are tackled and the facts are understood. I discovered when
dealing with rural affairs that when one considers statistics in rural
areas it is certainly the case in spades that the population may be so
small that half a county is covered by ward-level statistics. It is
important that the National Statistician has in mind not only the great
sweep of statistics and policy but the need for the statistics that are
produced, other than national
statistics, to be sufficiently fine-grained to be overlaid and used by
those who analyse service delivery requirements and so on.
I hope that
the Minister, if he is unable immediately to leap to accept the
sensible drafting of my amendment, will at least acknowledge the
importance of the issues and show that they are taken as a part of what
they are seeking to do in the Bill. I hope that the Minister can give a
positive response on a point that in practice will be important to
local authorities up and down the country, to voluntary and
non-governmental organisations that are concerned with local issues,
and to Members of Parliament. We frequently try to dig down into the
needs of our constituents and such information is important, as is
cross-cutting analysis rather than mere analysis down the silos of
different bits of information. Such information allows one to consider
health, education, economics and other social factors across the board.
I hope that the Minister will be able to respond positively on that
point, which in the long term will be of interest to Members from all
parties in the House in practice, even if it is not exciting to them
now.
Mr.
David Gauke (South-West Hertfordshire) (Con): We are
debating a long list of amendments. Indeed, I was somewhat worried that
much of this sitting would be taken up by your reading out the list,
Sir John, such was its considerable length.
Amendments Nos. 188 and 189
stand in my name and replicate what I proposed in amendments Nos. 186
and 187 with regard to non-executive members of the statistics board.
Amendments Nos. 188 and 189 would apply the same approach to the
National Statistician, who, as the Bill is drafted, will be appointed
under the royal prerogative. I propose, in the first instance, that the
appointment should be subject to the approvalof the
parliamentary commission, with a right of veto—as my hon. Friend
the Member for Chipping Barnet proposed in new clause 2—or,
alternatively, that the parliamentary commission should at least
produce a report, along the lines of the Select Committee on the
Treasury, with respect to appointments to the Bank of England’s
Monetary Policy Committee. I would not be surprised if we ended up with
something similar to the second approach, as a consequence of a Select
Committee taking it upon itself to hold such hearings.
I do not want to
rehearse all the arguments on that point again. When I made the case
for the power of veto on Tuesday, the Financial Secretary to the
Treasury said that it was appropriate that Ministers should play a role
in appointments, because to do so was a function of the Executive.
However, even under my proposal in amendment No. 188, Ministers would
still play a role. They would still appoint, or at least propose the
National Statistician, although not the number of non-executive
members. The proposal would be made by Ministers and it would be for
Parliament to confirm that appointment or otherwise. There would still
be considerable powers in the hands of Ministers, although the
Financial Secretary to the Treasury was making a broader
point—that the making of such appointments is an executive
function and that Ministers, as members of the Executive, should make
that appointment.
The
Financial Secretary’s argument is slightly conservative. We are
living in times when we can be a
little more radical in such matters. For instance,
the Chancellor of the Exchequer made some remarks on the “Sunday
AM” programme that are directly relevant to this
debate:
“We do
need a new settlement over these next few years between, if you like,
the executive, the legislature—and that is the power of
Parliament and the House of Commons—and people
themselves”.
He
continued:
“I
think we’re moving to a new understanding over the next few
years, of more accountable government, a stronger parliamentary
democracy, and a more active
population”.
One
of the areas in which there is a greater rolefor Parliament
and scope for greater accountabilityis in the exercise of the
royal prerogative in making appointments. We have an opportunity, here
and now, to begin that approach and to make an historic step forward in
parliamentary accountability. Were the Financial Secretary to the
Treasury to be sympathetic to that approach, his name would live on in
posterity as that of a wise, far-sighted and radical Minister who
recognised the importance of Parliament. He would become one of our
constitutional heroes—if he is not already one for other
reasons. I fear that this will be a missed opportunity, but I urge the
Government to consider the proposal
again.
I turn to other
aspects of the amendments. Many of them seek to address what many
outside observers see as a fundamental flaw. Confusion and potential
conflicts of interest exist, as it seems that the statistics board will
be conducting two sets of activities. First, it will be performing a
scrutinising audit role; secondly, it will be publishing statistics, as
the Office for National Statistics now does. One can read through the
Billand come to the conclusion that the statistics
boardis a scrutinising body, almost overlooking the
factthat it will continue to perform the executive function of
producing statistics. If the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West
will forgive me—hon. Members will know that it is rare to find a
more assiduous member of a Standing Committee—but in an
intervention on my hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet, he
challenged
her—
Mr.
Gauke:
It was a question; but the hon. Gentleman will know
that all his questions are challenging. He asked where in the Bill it
said that the statistics board would publish statistics, and my hon.
Friend was more than capable of answering him. None the less, it is
somewhat surprising that such an assiduous Member did not immediately
pick that up. If he will forgive me, I suspect that he had
not.
The publication
of statistics does not sit easily with the statistics board. There is a
distinction betweenits scrutinising and executive functions
and, to a considerable extent, I think that the Government recognise
that in the Bill. I say that because of the provisions of clause 29;
and a number of amendments in this group would affect that clause. I am
sure that the Financial Secretary will correct me if I am wrong, but
clause 29 states that some of the functions of the
statistics board set out in the Bill may be
performed by the National Statistician. Clause 29(3) contains reserve
powers. It states that
“The National
Statistician may
not”—
exercise the
function of adopting a code of practice; nor is he able to assess or
reassess whether official statistics comply with the code. That is
clearly for the board, and the board alone. I would be interested to
know from the Financial Secretary what is the rationale for
that.
For what it is
worth, I assume that those are areas of the code, and its assessment
and reassessment, for which the full credibility of the board is
necessary, and that it would be wrong to hand that power to one
individual. The fact that that approach does notapply to the
executive functions suggests that the Government realise the
distinction between the
two.
While I am on the subject,
under clause 29(4) the board is able to assert that it will not allow
certain of its functions to be performed by the National Statistician.
For that reason, amendments Nos. 128 and 129, tabled by the hon.
Members for Twickenham and for Falmouth and Camborne, do not quite
work. They seem to turn clause 29(4) around so that, rather than give a
power to the board to have a reserve right on certain functions, they
would prevent the board from directing the National Statistician to
perform certain functions, which is not the right way to deal with the
issue. None the less, where there is that distinction, the Government
have not taken the provision to its logical conclusion, which would be
to set out in the Bill precisely those activities that should be
performed by the National Statistician in the capacity of National
Statistician and those activities that are performed by the statistics
board.
9.15
am
Amendment No.
151 to clause 6(1) would make it clear that statistics were produced
not by the board but by the National Statistician. Amendments Nos. 100
to 102 apply a similar approach to clause 9, which relates to the
creation of definitions, methodologies and so on for statistics; that,
too, is an area for the National Statistician, not the statistics
board.
Why does that
matter? My hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet very ably set out
the arguments. A particularly important point is that if the statistics
board is drawn into a controversy about statistics that it has produced
and it is ultimately criticised strongly for the manner in which it has
produced them, that damages the credibility of the statistics board.
Given that the board is the very entity that we want to assess other
statistics and to be essentially the judge and jury on other
statistics, its position would be substantially weakened in such
circumstances, which would be
unfortunate.
My hon.
Friend also gave the example of a dispute relating to pensions
contributions and the manner in which it was possible to raise that
with the ONS but then go beyond that. When the ONS is within the same
body that conducts scrutiny, that will create a difficulty. During our
consideration, we have to remember that the Statistics Commission,
which has played a useful role in commenting on the
use of statistics, will no longer exist following the implementation of
the Bill. Clearly, the intention is that the statistics board will
fulfil the role that the Statistics Commission currently undertakes, but
if the statistics board is drawn into too many disputes because of its
own statistics, that will weaken its
position.
Mr.
Mark Hoban (Fareham) (Con): My hon. Friend is setting out
a very clear argument on why there is confusion at the heart of the
Bill between the scrutiny role of the board and its responsibilities
for the production of statistics. Can he envisage a situation in which
the board has to arbitrate or adjudicate between the views of the
National Statistician in his role of producing official statistics and
the views of the head of assessments, who has to assess and reassess
national statistics? He may have a disagreement with the National
Statistician about how those statistics are produced. The board, which
has responsibility for both production and assessment, will be drawn
into a great conflict within itself because of the actions and the
views of two different people. Would it not be easier simply to prise
away at board level those two different responsibilities, so that it is
clear that one organisation is responsible for the overview—the
scrutiny—of statistics and one organisation is responsible for
their
production?
Mr.
Gauke:
My hon. Friend makes a very good point. I assume
that the logic of his argument brings into question the position of the
National Statistician as an executive member of the statistics board.
Certainly there are issues in that respect, but there are various
permutations of potential disputes within the statistics board. The
provision creates a regrettable flaw.
I would be interested to know
how the Financial Secretary envisages clause 29 working as the
arrangements settle down. To be fair, it may be impossible for him to
give a view, but what does he envisage will be, in practice, the
delineation of responsibilities between the National Statistician and
the statistics board? Is it expected—or at least, would he be
surprised if it were the case—that ultimately the National
Statistician will produce all the statistics, and that the statistics
board will find itself not producing the statistics, as it is empowered
to do under clause 6?I would be interested to know his
thinking regarding that
area.
Rob
Marris:
The hon. Gentleman adverted to my intervention on
the hon. Member for Chipping Barnet at column 80 of the Official
Report of the afternoon sitting. She did not pick up on the
implication of my question to her, so perhaps I will now make it clear
to him because of the large number of amendments that have been tabled.
He is discussing the potential conflict between use and supervision, if
I can put it that way, to explain why he did not seek to amend clause
6(1)(a)(i) and clause 18(1) and (2), which are to do with the
production of statistics by the board. If he thinksthat there
might be a conflict, another way to resolve the conflict that he
foresees would be to take out the production side and simply leave in
the supervision side, rather than to employ the complicated method,
including tabling a huge number of amendments, with which he seeks to
deal with the issue.
Mr.
Gauke:
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman.In
fact, my hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet seeks to amend
clause 6(1)(a)(i) with amendment No. 151, and I
think that the hon. Gentleman will find there are similar
amendments—Nos. 103 to 107—in respect of clause 18. He
raises a good point, but I think that it has been
addressed.
Rob
Marris:
With respect, it has not. I was aware of those
amendments; they would insert the words “National
Statistician”, instead of the word “Board”. They
would leave production with the National Statistician—that is
the general, overarching thrust of the hon. Gentleman’s
amendments and those of his hon. Friend. I am suggesting that another
way to resolve that perceived conflict between production and
supervision would have been to take production out of the Bill
completely. The hon. Gentleman has chosen not to follow that route;
that is obviously his choice, but I wonder whether he can explain that
choice.
Mr.
Gauke:
The hon. Gentleman makes a case for one way of
dealing with the issue. However, one would expect the National
Statistician to be involved in the production of statistics, because,
as I understand it, that is traditionally what the National
Statistician does. The hon. Gentleman proposes a more radical step than
has been proposed by the Opposition. It seems to me that, given where
we are on the Bill, it is a perfectly reasonable approach to try to
divide the activities between the National Statistician and the
statistics board. That is the approach that is outlined in the various
amendments.
Mrs.
Theresa Villiers (Chipping Barnet) (Con): It is worth the
Committee bearing in mind that the National Statistician is currently
very much involved in the production of statistics, because she runs
the ONS. The Opposition would be reluctant to table an amendment
suggesting that that involvement should cease. It makes sense to beef
up the role of the National Statistician. An amendment that sought to
restrict her ability to take part in the production of statistics would
cause great problems. That is why I took the approach that I
did.
Mr.
Gauke:
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for clarifying the
position; indeed, I am convinced by her
remarks.
Julia
Goldsworthy (Falmouth and Camborne) (LD): In a similar
vein, does the hon. Gentleman agree with the submission of the chief
statistician of Canada that the proposals that we have before us
already weaken the role of the National Statistician, and we should be
seeking to strengthen that role, not to weaken it further, which is
what the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West seems to be
indicating we should do?
Mr.
Gauke:
The hon. Lady makes a good point. It is well worth
considering the testimony that the Treasury Sub-Committee received from
the chief statistician of Canada. There is a concern that we have a
structure in the Bill wherein the National Statistician is not in as
strong a position as she should be. Indeed, my hon. Friend the Member
for Sevenoaks has tabled a number of important amendments relating to
the status of the National Statistician. Returning briefly to
amendments Nos. 188 and 189, the fact that there would be
high-profile parliamentary hearings regarding the role of the National
Statistician would help the profile of the post and suggest a higher
status and sense of power in the hands of the
National Statistician. Anything that weakens the position of the
National Statistician in the Bill would be
regrettable.
Rob
Marris:
I make it clear to the hon. Gentleman and to the
Committee that I was not proposing anything. I was suggesting that
there were two alternatives that he and his colleagues could have
chosen. He has chosen one alternative and I was simply inquiring why he
had not chosen the other. I am grateful to him and his colleagues for
their
explanation.
Mr.
Gauke:
As ever, I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for
his characteristically assiduous and thoughtful
interventions.
I move
on to another set of arguments in relation to this group of
amendments—
Mr.
Michael Fallon (Sevenoaks) (Con): Before my hon. Friend
moves on, the intervention made quite fairly by the hon. Member for
Wolverhampton, South-West may be assiduous and thoughtful, but it may
also be wrong. The two alternatives are not equally valid. If we take
the National Statistician out of the production of statistics
altogether, all we would end up with in the Bill is the replacement of
the commission by the board. The board would be the same as the
commission, except it would have some kind of statutory basis. That
would result in an even weaker Bill than the Government are
proposing.
Mr.
Gauke:
Perhaps I should have said that it is
characteristic of the hon. Member for Wolverhampton, South-West to be
assiduous, thoughtful and wrong.
I move on to another set of
arguments. We touched upon the co-ordination role for the statistics
board, which leads us to issues relating to clause 10, which is about
the code of practice. I will confine my remarks to the amendments
tabled, but there is concern among the statistical community about the
lack of co-ordination in relation to statistics that are classified as
official, not national, statistics. The submissions received by members
of the Public Bill Committee, the testimonies provided to the Treasury
Sub-Committee and other evidence reveal widespread concern about the
dichotomy between national and official
statistics.
The
Chairman:
Order. The hon. Gentleman’s comments are
now wide even of this enormous group of amendments in that he is
discussing amendments that will come up under clause 10, for example
amendment Nos. 140 and 91. We are at risk of deviating too far because
of the complexity of this large group of
amendments.
Mr.
Gauke:
I will bring my comments back to amendment Nos. 29
and 98 which deal with the roleof the National Statistician in
co-ordinating statistical planning and production. In that context,
those amendments are part of the
issue.
Mr.
Gauke:
I do not wish to get into the issues relating to
clause 10, and, Sir John, you are, of course, right to remind me of
that. I merely raise the issue in the context of concern in the
statistics community that that, although clause 10 sets up a code of
practice for national statistics, the statistics board will not have a
sufficiently large role in areas outside national statistics. The
intention behind amendments Nos. 98 and 29 isto beef up its
role and give the board power and responsibility to co-ordinate
activities.
9.30
am
I have no doubt
that the Financial Secretary’s argument against the amendments
will be that we have a decentralised system and that it should be
preserved. I understand that argument and those about keeping
statisticians close to data sources and able to move among Departments
and so on. I thought that the speech made by the hon. Member for City
of York (Hugh Bayley) on Second Reading was an interesting examination
of the various arguments—clearly, he was not persuaded by some
of them. There is something to be said for amendments Nos. 29 and 98,
which would improve the co-ordination role. They were supported by
submissions from several outside
experts.
Mr.
Hoban:
My hon. Friend is making an important point about
the co-ordination role that the National Statistician and the board can
undertake. It would underpin the board’s responsibilities under
clause 8, which deals with the monitoring and reporting of official
statistics. I suspect that the extension of the National
Statistician’s powers that he wants would enable the board to
fulfil more fully and adequately its role under clause
8.
The
Chairman:
Order. We are again going wide even of this
group of amendments. I apologise to right hon. and hon. Members. The
grouping was done with the advice of counsel, who, while well meaning,
perhaps did not entirely appreciate the difficulty that the grouping
would create in Committee for Members to remain in order. I apologise
to the Committee, but we must not go even wider than the grouping
permits, otherwise chaos
ensues.
Mr.
Gauke:
Thank you, Sir John. I am grateful for the
intervention of my hon. Friend the Member for Fareham. I shall not
dwell on it, but he makes a good
point.
Amendments Nos.
97 and 127 to clause 28 address the same point about the role of the
National Statistician in respect of official statistics that are not
national statistics. I shall not labour the point, but there is much
outside concern about the issue. The arguments are similar to those
that applied to amendments Nos. 29 and 98. How does
the statistics board or the National Statistician deal with official
statistics? Amendments Nos. 97 and 127 seek to provide a role for the
National Statistician in giving advice to the Government on official
statistics—largely departmental statistics. It would be a useful
addition to the Bill to enable the National Statistician not to
exercise control in absolute terms—we would still retain a
decentralised system—but to perform a greater role in guiding
and advising the Government.
Rob
Marris:
I shall not go through all the
amendments—there are a great many, Sir John—but if the
amendments that the hon. Gentleman and other
Opposition Members have tabled were passed, the job
and role of the National Statistician, albeit bearing in mind the
inevitable delegation, would be enormous and
undoable.
Mr.
Gauke:
I am not sure that I agree with the hon. Gentleman.
As ever he is probing our arguments thoroughly, but he suggested
earlier that our amendments were not radical enough and now he suggests
that they are too radical. If our amendments were made, the role of the
National Statistician would become more important, and the status and
profile of the National Statistician would be strengthened,
butI do not believe, particularly when one makes comparisons
with the historical role of the National Statisticians and
international comparisons, that the job would be such that it could not
be done. I am not sure about whether I agree with the hon. Gentleman on
that point.
I have
spoken to the amendments for long enough, I think. They address a large
number of the arguments on whether enough is done in the Bill for
official statistics that are not national statistics, on whether there
is conflict of interest and a blurring of the lines of responsibility
between the National Statistician and the statistics board, and on the
position of Parliamentin scrutinising the appointment of the
National Statistician. I look forward to the comments of the Financial
Secretary, because our discussion this morning is perhaps one of the
most important that we will have during the course of the Bill. Many of
the key weaknesses of the Bill are revealed, and a number of the
amendments deal with those issues and can address the
problems.
Julia
Goldsworthy:
As I was not here on Tuesday, I take this
opportunity formally to welcome you to the Chair, Sir John.
To try to stay in order as I
speak to this large group of amendments, I shall focus on the common
themes in the speeches that have already been made, which relate to the
relationship between the National Statistician and the board as well as
the role of the National Statistician and the status that that role
should be given. Those two issues are important, because one of the key
problems that have been highlighted by the statistical community is the
muddiness of that relationship.
The Royal Statistical
Society’s response to the publication of the Bill
states:
“As
drafted the Bill muddles the roles of the Board and the National
Statistician. This lack of clearly distinct roles and responsibilities
will cause confusion and will undermine public
confidence in the system if circumstances arise
where the Board needs to comment publicly on some failure within
ONS.”
It goes on to say
that the board
“should
instead hold the National Statistician to account for these
responsibilities so separating the role of statistical producer from
the role of monitoring to ensure that the public interest is
served.”
The society said
that it believes that to be the intention behind the Bill, but that
that is not what is achieved by the Bill as it
stands.
Mrs.
Villiers:
Does the hon. Lady agree that the problem to
which she and the RSS have referred is intensified by the fact that the
Statistics Commission is effectively being merged into the Office for
National Statistics? The loss of that separate oversight body
constitutes the removal of an existing safeguard, so the Bill could
result in a system that is weaker in some respects than the current
arrangements.
Julia
Goldsworthy:
That is the key concern. Although there is an
attempt to build a series of Chinese walls, the result is a confusing
maze and unintended conflicts.
Amendment No. 120, which stands
in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for
Twickenham,is an attempt to clear up the muddiness of the
relationship by making it clear that the National Statistician is
independent of the board but still subject to its scrutiny and
oversight. That is not explicit in the Bill as drafted.
Amendment No. 21, which would
amend clause 8, is an attempt to provide clarity by giving the board
the responsibility to monitor and assess the performance of the
National Statistician. Again, the aim is to create a degree of
separation that is not there now. A lot of the other amendments that
would replace the word “Board” with “National
Statistician” are designed to do exactly the same, in order to
make the Bill consistent. I do not think that it is necessarily helpful
to go into all the amendments in great detail, because the case has
already been made for many of them, but amendment No. 100 is another
good example of trying to create that separation. As the Bill is
drafted, the board has the wherewithal to produce statistics—I
understand that that raises an issue to which the hon. Member for
Wolverhampton, South-West referred in previous debates—yet
clause 8 also makes it clear that it also has a responsibility for
scrutiny. Amendment No. 100 would separate those two
roles.
Amendment No.
127, which would amend clause 28, raises the second issue—that
of the National Statistician’s status. It would make the
National Statistician the principal advisor, which would be appropriate
in terms of the National Statistician’s specialist role in the
production of statistics. In a way, it seems absurd to create that role
but to limit it to national statistics, rather than expand it to
statistics as a whole. I see no reason why either the guidelines that
are produced or the National Statistician’s principal role
cannot apply in principle to other statistics. In fact, if Ministers
decide what statistics are to be considered as national statistics and
if the opportunity does not exist to bridge those two different grades
of statistics, how will the lower tier ever make it to the higher tier?
It is also important to provide a leadership role for all those who
produce and use
statistics.
I should
like to refer briefly to the Treasury Sub-Committee’s work and
the Bank of England’s response. The Bank of England found the
proposals to be somewhat unclear and noted that the role of the
National Statistician under the new arrangement did not seem akin to
that of the National Statistician under the present framework. Again,
those concerns were raised by the chief statistician of Canada, who was
concerned that the proposals weakened the role of the National
Statistician. Our amendments would address
those concerns. I therefore welcome clause 29,
because it would beef up the role and status of the National
Statistician.
Amendments Nos. 128 and 129
would amendclause 29. We shall not press those amendments to a
vote,; we are simply trying to raise the key question whether there is
a potential for conflict between being scrutinised by the board and
being directed by the board.
Mr.
Gauke:
My interpretation of the Bill as drafted is that
the board is able to reserve some of its powers to itself and to
prevent the National Statistician from performing certain roles given
to the board under the Bill. Amendments Nos. 128 and 129 put the matter
the other way round and would prevent the National Statistician from
exercising particular powers, so on this occasion I am sympathetic to
what I anticipate the Financial Secretary to the Treasury will
say.
Julia
Goldsworthy:
I certainly take on board the hon.
Gentleman’s points, although I am disappointed that there was no
reference to his wife, who I understand is not particularly interested
in this area, which is a great
shame.
Mr.
Hoban:
I am slightly curious about the impact of
amendments Nos. 128 and 129. Under clause
29(4),
“The
Board may direct the National Statistician...as to how he should
exercise a particular
function.”
Would the
consequence of the hon. Lady’s amendments be that the board
would not be able to direct the National Statistician on how to
exercise a particular function? If he is doing something wrong and
continues to do so, should the board, in her view, be unable to tell
him to correct his
mistakes?
9.45
am
Julia
Goldsworthy:
I can see the point that the hon. Gentleman
is making. We were pressing for greater independence for the National
Statistician. That is the clarity that we sought to introduce in the
amendment.
We welcome
amendment No. 15, tabled by the hon. Member for Sevenoaks. It, too,
provides clarity, as itis not obvious who is responsible for
making the appointment. Given that the Treasury takes primary
responsibility for the board, I would understand a Treasury Minister
being made responsible for the appointment. However, we have a great
deal of sympathy with the proposal to transfer that responsibility to
the Cabinet Office, as the Treasury is such a great consumer of
statistics. On that basis, we support that
amendment.
The
Chairman:
Order. I remind hon. Members that, although we
are discussing the amendments now, the hon. Members who have tabled
them have the opportunity, should they wish to press them to a
Division, to do so when we reach the clause to which they relate. Do you
wish to reply, Mr. Healey?
The
Financial Secretary to the Treasury (John Healey):
I thank
you, Sir John. I had not realised that the hon. Member for Falmouth and
Camborne had petered to a halt. I was waiting for the culmination of
her contribution, but I missed it.
It has been an illuminating
debate—and flattering in parts. As the hon. Member for
South-West Hertfordshire observed, it is probably one of the most
important discussions that the Committee will have. In summary, we
heard an explanation of a wide set of amendments—from the hon.
Member for Falmouth and Camborne for the Liberal Democrats, from the
hon. Member for Chipping Barnet for the official Opposition, and from
my right hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, South and
Penarth.
Essentially,
the amendments seek to bolster the role and status of the National
Statistician, in response to the perceptions and concerns that may have
been raised with or occurred to members of the Committee. They also
reflect concerns about the distinction between the board’s
scrutiny role and its executive statistical production
functions.
Given the
detailed and reflective nature of the debate, it may help if I try at
the outset to explain the thinking behind the provisions. I appreciate
that for many, particularly those in the statistical community, it is a
matter of leading concern. I am not certain that everyone is entirely
clear about exactly what is being proposed.
As we heard during the debate,
the Bill is indeed part of the new settlement of which the Chancellor
has spoken. It is one of a series of steps that he has put in place,
setting out arrangements for the modern economic governance of the
country. It is based on track records and our commitment that, as we
have demonstrated, we will, when appropriate, devolve ministerial power
by statute to credible and independent institutions the remit of which
is set by the House and the Government.
The Committee will recognise
the Government’s belief that sharing accountability collectively
acrossa group of individuals from a wide range of backgrounds
and with a wide range of experience will in the end deliver better
results than vesting all authority in one individual. At the centre of
the Bill, therefore, we have the new independent statistics board.
During the
development of our reform proposals and through the process of
consultation, we examined carefully the case for creating the scrutiny
board as a wholly separate body—in other words, essentially
putting the Statistics Commission on a statutory
footing that is completely separate from statistical
production.
However,
we had another important policy and reform goal, which is one that many
have supported. That was to place the ONS and the National Statistician
on an independent statutory footing; no longer reporting directly to
Ministers but independent, statutory and reporting elsewhere. One of
the ways of doing that was to remove Ministers from the direct
accountability structure. Everyone agrees that that was the right move,
and I have not heard serious voices
suggesting otherwise. By doing so, it is important to replace the role
of Ministers in overseeing the National Statistician and their staff.
In considering that, we concluded two things.
First, that the oversight role is best delivered by a board for the
reasons that I have just explained and as explained in relation to the
proposal for a parliamentary commission. Secondly, we concluded that it
would be best to establish a single oversight board to scrutinise the
statistical system and to provide the top governance layer for an
independent ONS. One of the key reasons for that was to avoid creating
competing independent statutory centres of statistical
expertise.
Our chosen model is the board,
which is able to draw on the professional advice of the independent
statutory National Statistician rather than requiring its own separate
independent professional adviser and voice. That leads to a series of
reasonable questions that it is right to pose about the proper
separation of functions, which the Treasury Committee in its inquiry
and report dealt with assiduously. In the arrangements contained in the
Bill we tried to reflect comments from the Select Committee in
particular. The single structure includes arrangements that ensure a
clear delineation of the production and scrutiny responsibilities. We
have set that out in the
Bill.
Mrs.
Villiers:
The Financial Secretary will forgive me if he
was going on to deal with my point. I appreciate that he attempted to
respond to the consultation process by incorporating the concept of a
head of assessment as opposed to a delegated office. However, if the
National Statistician is designated chief executive of the board,
surely that gives her a remit across the whole function given to the
board by statute, in other words its executive and assessment
functions. Does clause 29(1) not undermine the separation to which he
has just
referred?
John
Healey:
No. If the hon. Lady will bear with me and study
some of the provisions in the Bill, she will see that the important
assessment and scrutiny functions of the board, which if one wanted to
draw a parallel may be called regulatory although I am unsure that is
quite the right term, may raise issues of a potential conflict of
interest. The legislation is clear that the head of assessment and the
staff can have nothing to do with the production function of statistics
and that the National Statistician should not be involved in that. The
assessment function will be operationally independent of production in
the executive office. A second statutory post holder—the head of
assessment—will be created to report directly to the board and
will lead the assessment function and all the staff working on
assessment.
Mr.
Hoban:
The Financial Secretary answered in part the
question that I was going to pose—I would have raised it during
the stand part debate if it had not come up in the discussion
today—about the distinction between the head of assessment and
the National Statistician. He said that the head of assessment would be
separate from the National Statistician and that he would report
directly to the board. Does the Financial Secretary expect that the
head of assessment will be entirely independent of the chief executive
of the board—the National Statistician—and that he will
have full control over his staff, the terms and
conditions of appointment and the work that they do? Does he expect
that, in effect, there will be two separate organisational groups
operating under the remit of the
board?
John
Healey:
In practice, I would expect the boardto
take an interest in details such as the terms and conditions of any
staff whom it is ultimately responsible for appointing, but in respect
of the responsibility and accountability for carrying outthe
assessment functions and all the activities related to the assessment
function, any staff working in that area will be separate from those on
the production side and will report directly and only to the head of
assessment. The head of assessment will report directly and only to the
board. The National Statistician will have no involvement. The
production staff and managerswill have no involvement. They
will therefore be operationally separate, and that operational
separation is codified in the
Bill.
The
Chairman:
Order. I should say that, in discussing the
staff, hon. Members are going somewhat wider than the amendments that
they are supposed to be discussing. The issues that hon. Members are
discussing would normally be dealt with in a clause stand part debate,
which I propose to allow. I call Julia
Goldsworthy.
Julia
Goldsworthy:
Thank you, Sir John. Doesthe
Financial Secretary agree that the statistical community is confused by
the proposals in the Bill, as the submission from the Royal Statistical
Society shows? Would it not be a good idea to follow up the issue
raised by the hon. Member for South-West Hertfordshire and set out
clearly in the Bill a summary of the function of the board and the
function of the National Statistician, because at this point there is
still a lot of confusion out
there?
John
Healey:
I began by saying that I thought that many in the
statistics community were not entirely clear about the proposals in the
Bill and the way in which they were designed to operate. I hope that
the scrutiny and deliberations of the Committee will help to illuminate
that.
Mr.
Gauke:
I am grateful to the Financial Secretary for his
remarks about the operational points. To the extent that this is
relevant to the discussion that weare having about clarity,
will he accept that, notwithstanding those
operational divisions, statistics will still be produced under the
structure set out in the Bill, whereby statistics will be labelled as
produced by the statistics board? People closely involved in this area
may appreciate that that is done by the operational side as opposed to
the assessment side, but to the wider public, the statistics will still
be produced by the statistics board. That gives rise to confusion and
possible damage to the reputation of the statistics board in the event
of a controversy.
John
Healey:
I suppose that there may be a theoretical risk of
that. I am sure that that will be a feature that Parliament will
examine closely in following closely the way in which the board and its
operations are established and the way in which its duties and
responsibilities are discharged. In practice, the legislative
separation in the Bill, the professionalism that we can expect from
those involved in statistical production and assessment, the sense of
service and commitment to providing the best possible statistical
service that we are likely to see in those whom we appoint as
non-executives to the board, the fact that all involved are likely to
work to common goals, and the fact that this is a system, a board and
an institution that is by law independent from Ministers will provide
the basis for what will prove to be a very sound and increasingly
authoritative and credible body. It is one of the underlying purposes
of the legislation that that will lead to improving credibility and
quality in official statistics in this country—the statistics on
which so many of us, in different ways and for different purposes,
rely.
Mrs.
Villiers:
I am grateful to the Financial Secretary for his
characteristic generosity in giving way. In addressing the points made
by Opposition Members and in helping to reassure those in the
statistical community who are confused about how the system will work
in practice, perhaps he could give comparisons with existing
institutions that are organised along similar lines; that is, with an
internal split between scrutiny functions and
production.
10
am
John
Healey:
I think that the hon. Lady would accept that we
are dealing with the imperatives, interests and importance of
statistics. There are no direct comparators—they are difficult
to find. Even international experience, which we have studied
carefully, does not immediately suggest a single obvious and consistent
model that is used elsewhere. When one considers the different nature
of governance and use of statistics in other countries, again, there is
not a ready model that can be borrowed and imported to Britain. We are
constructing something that is breaking new ground, that is radical and
innovative.
As I have
stressed in public and in Parliament, we are setting up a system and a
framework that can evolve in the light of experience and, crucially,
the judgment that Parliament makes on how well the board is carrying
out its duties. That is one of the reasons why members
of the Committee, including my right hon. Friend
the Member for Cardiff, South and Penarth, will hearme say
consistently that it is important to set the
framework and the principles in the legislation but
not be too prescriptive about how we require the board to discharge its
functions.
To respond
further to the point raised by the hon. Member for Chipping Barnet, let
me amplify my argument. Some view the statistics board as some sort of
regulator. It is important to be quite clear about the nature of the
audit and assessment function that the board will be required to
perform to give confidence in the integrity, credibility and quality of
statistics. In many ways, it is hard to make the argument at anything
other than a superficial level that somehow the board is
a regulator. I do not think that it will stand comparison with, for
instance, a regulator of competition among
industries.
In
essence, the statistics board’s assessment and audit function is
much softer in nature, in terms of auditing or regulation. It is about
setting and assessing against standards of production and handling of
statistics. The questions of compliance that the board will be
askedto consider are likely to be specific technical and
professional questions; for example, assessing what is done in practice
against a published code and set of standards for which the board
itself is responsible. That is an important auditing function but not
one that could credibly be called a regulatory function and therefore
close to the models of the regulatory authorities and functions that we
are used to in this
country.
Mr.
Hoban:
I am following the Financial Secretary’s
arguments closely. He said something that strikes a chord with me,
because prior to coming to theHouse, I worked as a chartered
accountant with PricewaterhouseCoopers. I spent a considerable part of
my career as an auditor and assessed company numbers against public
standards, and checked whether businesses complied with accounting
standards. That involved a process, and the distinction I draw is that
confidence
was—
The
credibility of the data that are produced by listed companies is
dependent upon an external audit. An external audit validates those
data and an opinion is given on the financial statements. The same
degree of credibility, however, does not come from those functions
being performed internally by an internal audit. The Financial
Secretary suggests that there should be an internal audit within a
board, but in the private sector the validity comes from an external
audit. In a way, that is another argument for drawing out the scrutiny
part from the board’s activities in its overview of
production.
John
Healey:
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. He expressed
his concern in an earlier intervention in a way that illustrated the
over-inflated nature of the risks that some claim might be contained in
the proposed model. He has just introduced a
similar point, but in much more measured and sharply observed terms,
with which I shall try to deal in two ways.
First, we have proposed that
the discharge of the assessment function be separated in statute from
the production function of the statistics office, unlike with an
internal or external audit function in a corporation.
So, there is a statutory separation. Secondly, the
statistics produced by the executive office—currently the ONS,
but in future the statistics office, answerable to the
board—will be assessed to the same standards and with same
rigour as the national statistics thatare produced elsewhere
in Government by other Departments, the majority of which are not
produced by the ONS, as we have discussed.
The hon. Member for Chipping
Barnet asked what would happen if the statistics that are currently
produced by the ONS fell short, creating an intolerable conflict of
interest and tension for the board. I accept
that we might face a situation in which the statistics that were
produced by one arm of the independent board—in other words, the
statistics office—might require criticism because they did not
meet the standards met by the others, under the code and the
assessments function. However, I simply do not see how it would be in
the board’s interests not to make the critical comments and
judgments that might be required and not to seek the improvements in
quality and activity that might need to flow from them. I simply do not
see a non-executive-led board being likely to refrain from challenging
or criticising the statistical production, which is currently carried
on in the ONS, if that was
required.
The
Chairman:
Order. The Minister is intending to be helpful
to the Committee, but he is going quite a long way into the objectives
that are set out in clause 7 on the quality of the statistics, which is
not covered by the group of amendments that we are discussing. We need
to take the Bill in the order in which it is printed, subject to the
variations brought about by the grouping of amendments, but I am afraid
that we have gone beyond that and are straying into other
areas.
John
Healey:
I am grateful for your guidance,Sir John.
As you observed earlier, the choice of amendments in the current group
makes some elements of what is a directly associated debate a little
difficult.
I make my
final observation on the concern that flows from the separation of
functions, which is dealt with in this group, and the likelihood of the
board deciding not to criticise or challenge when that was required or
when standards had fallen short. If I, as the Minister responsible for
the ONS under the current arrangements, criticise, challenge and make
public, where that is required, the quality of the statistics or how
the ONS operates—as I do and have done, on migration statistics,
the quality of local and regional economic data, and on aspects of the
census functions—it is hard to argue that there would be a risk
of the board not doing that in
future.
Mrs.
Villiers:
Will not a more significant problem arise not
when the board decides that the ONS has done something wrong and issues
a rebuke, but when it decides that the ONS has
acted correctly? Will the claimant not respond, “Well, you would
say that. You were responsible for making the decision in the first
place”?
John
Healey:
We will deal with that in
other parts of the Bill. The board will be required to publish the
results of the assessments and audits of national statistics that it
undertakes. The board will confirm the judgment and what lies behind
it, and that will be clear for examination and challenge. It will be
clear also for Parliament should it wish to pick up such matters with
the board. We have built into the structure the safeguards for the
unlikely situation that the hon. Lady is talking about.
The National Statistician,
together with the executive office and the head of assessment, will
exercise clearly separated functions on behalf of the board and will
ultimately be under its direction. The board, for clarity, is the legal
entity that will statutorily be responsible for the exercise of the
functions established in the Bill. Consequently, it is the entity that
is referred to throughout. The board replaces the role of the Minister,
which I currently play, in overseeing and supporting the National
Statistician and it will therefore be held to account in delivering the
statutory functions in the Bill. In my view, it would not be right to
break that line of accountability and to confer some of the duties
proposed in the amendments directly on to the National Statistician. It
is right that the system should be overseen by a board with ultimate
accountability shared across a group of individuals rather than vesting
that accountability on one single individual, the National
Statistician.
I turn now,
with some helpful general explanations and points, to some of the
amendments. I turn first to those tabled by the hon. Member for
Sevenoaks, which he said were designed to boost the status of the
National Statistician. I hope that he will recognise that the Bill and
our proposals do that in a significant and groundbreaking way. They
create the National Statistician as a statutory post and set out that
the Crown will make the appointment. The functions are placed on a
statutory footing and there is a requirement for the board publicly to
justify any departure or decision that runs contrary to the
professional advice of the National Statistician. The Bill gives the
National Statistician a unique and high status codified in statute. A
pause for thought will allow the Committee to recognise the force of
that.
10.15
am
The nearest
comparators in government to the National Statistician that one could
think of might be the chief medical officer or the chief scientific
adviser. Neither is a statutory appointment and although they lead
their respective professions in government, there are no disciplines
about the Government following their advice and certainly no
disciplines about publishing reasons why their advice has not been
followed. I have also made it clear, as have the Government in our
formal response to the public consultation and at other stages, that we
intend the National Statistician to be the head of the government
statistical service and thereby offer the necessary
professional leadership to the specialist
statisticians who will continue to operate and be employed in other
Departments.
Julia
Goldsworthy:
The Financial Secretary mentioned the
similarities between the new role of National Statistician and those of
the chief medical officer and chief scientist. Does he know who
appoints those
officers?
John
Healey:
There are established procedures for those
officers. The Committee’s concern is principally to consider the
appointment of the National Statistician, as the
hon. Member for Sevenoaks encouraged us to do. It will be a Crown
appointment. Let me address the hon. Gentleman’s points now. I
confirm that when appointing the National Statistician, we will follow
the usual, established procedures for such matters.
The Queen makes Crown
appointments, and is advised on them by the Prime Minister or the Lord
Chancellor. With this appointment, the Prime Minister will advise her.
It is usual, with such appointments, for the Prime
Minister to be advised by the relevant departmental Minister. Given
that the residual
ministerial responsibilities for appointments will rest with the
Treasury, we would expect the Treasury to administer the selection
process and the Chancellor of the Exchequer to advise the Prime
Minister on the appointment. It would be over-prescriptive to stipulate
in the Bill which Minister should advise the Queenon this
process. I think that all members of the Committee agree that what is
important is that the selection process should be open, fair, and
conducted in line with the high standards that we expect for
suchan office.
I turn to amendment No. 16,
with which the hon. Member for Sevenoaks addresses the issue of the
National Statistician having direct access to the Prime Minister. I do
not consider that to be appropriate or necessary in the Bill. When he
spoke to the amendment, he quoted Lord Moser telling the Select
Committee that it is important that the National Statistician’s
boss is the Prime Minister. With respect, that misses the whole point
of the Bill, which is intended to ensure that no Minister is the
National Statistician’s boss.
The hon. Gentleman and the hon.
Member for Chipping Barnet are also concerned about the National
Statistician having access to the Prime Minister about issues and
disputes with Departments. One interesting and unusual, if not unique,
feature of the post of National Statistician is that it has, codified
under the framework for national statistics, access rights to the Prime
Minister through the head of the civil service. On page 20, at
4.3.4(l), the framework states that the National Statistician
will
“have the right of
access to the Prime Minister, through the Head of the Home Civil
Service, on matters concerning the integrity and validity of official
statistics including on resources where he/she believes they impact on
the integrity and validity of official
statistics”.
We intend
that the National Statistician will continue to have that right of
access. The key point is that the National Statistician’s
position is codified. It is more codified than any comparable
post—the chief scientific officer does not have such codified
access, nor does the head of the Government economic service. The wider
position of the National Statistician is very
different and much more formalised than it was in the days of Lord
Moser.
Amendments
Nos. 97 and 127 would require the Bill to state that the National
Statistician shall be the Government’s chief adviser on
statistics. The National Statistician’s chief adviser role is
already well established. Under the Bill, the National Statistician is
the board’s chief professional adviser, and
the board must take account of the National Statistician’s
advice on all statistical matters and must publish and report to
Parliament if it overrules the National Statistician on professional
technical matters, giving its reasons. This House and others will be
able to scrutinise closely any such
decision.
Under the
duties and powers established in the Bill, the board, in turn, advises
Government Departments on statistical issues, including such technical
matters as methodological definition and classificatory issues, as well
as on standards for official statistics. In practice,
the National Statistician might well do that on the board’s
behalf from day to day. As I have already said, we intend the National
Statistician to be the head of the Government statistical service,
providing the professional leadership required and being useful to
those working on statistics in other parts of Government.
We have, however, chosen to
retain our established, decentralised statistical system, with
professional heads of statistics in the Departments under the
leadership of the National Statistician. That decision has been widely
supported, including by the Treasury Committee. A decentralised system
inevitably means that statisticians will continue to work within the
Departments; it is not appropriate to legislate within the civil
service structure for lines of accountability between staff working in
Departments and the National Statistician working in another
body.
The next set of
amendments seeks to reassign a number of the responsibilities in the
Bill from the board to the National Statistician. We expect the
National Statistician to undertake all those responsibilities on the
board’s behalf, through the executive office that it will be
required to establish. Under clause 29(2), the board may delegate its
functions to the National Statistician, with a couple of limited
exceptions that relate to the board’s assessment function. The
hon. Member for South-West Hertfordshire was concerned about that, and
I think that he will accept that it is
appropriate.
Mrs.
Villiers:
Returning to the separation of assessment and
executive functions, if the board were taking a decision about a
complaint made about ONS, would the National Statistician be present at
the meeting? Would she be able to take part? The board cannot delegate
assessment functions to her, but if it were voting on a complaint
relating to her work, would she, as a member of the board, be able to
vote?
John
Healey:
I have made it clear that I am reluctant to see
the functions and workings of the board prescribed in primary
legislation. The way in which the board conducts its meetings is a
matter for the board to address in future. I do not think that the hon.
Lady would expect me to offer a firm observation, and it would not be
right to set that out during this Committee’s
proceedings.
I am
disappointed that we have not made sufficient progress to allow me to
deal with all the points that have been
made.
Mr.
Gauke:
I appreciate why assessment is the reserve of the
board, and I would go further: why not make clear what is the
responsibility of the board and what is the responsibility of the
National Statistician?
It being
twenty-five minutes past Ten o’clock,
The
Chairman
adjourned the Committee without Question put,
pursuant to the Standing Order.
Adjourned till
this day at One
o’clock.
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