The report by the UK Statistics Authority on the release by the Office of National Statistics of employment statistics classified by country of birth, taken alongside its previous report on the Home Office premature release of knife crime statistics, confirms that the Authority is the independent and impartial body that Parliament intended, says the Royal Statistical Society.
 
The Society is pleased to see that the Authority is treating equally all who breach its Code of Practice, be they Ministers of State or the Office for National Statistics. This equality of approach is key to restoring public trust in official statistics by ensuring that not only is everyone working to coherent standards but, crucially, that they are seen to be doing so.
 
Royal Statistical Society Vice-President, Jill Leyland, says:
 
"With these reports UK Statistics Authority has shown itself to be even-handed, authoritative and independent.
 
"This was the intention of Parliament when it passed the Statistics and Registration Service Act in 2007, following then Chancellor Gordon Brown's announcement in late 2005 that the Office for National Statistics should become 'a wholly separate body at arms length from Government and fully independent of it'.
 
"Much of the debate on the legislation focused on the need to address the low levels of public trust in official statistics. Surveys had shown that perceptions of political interference were a major factor in these low levels of trust.
 
"Change in our statistical system is needed, and this may be uncomfortable at times.  The whole point of establishing the UK Statistics Authority was to enable trust in official statistics to be re-established.
 
"There is still much work to be done but the Royal Statistical Society believes that the Authority has passed its first tests with distinction. It is becoming a body that Parliament and ultimately the public can look to with confidence."