Committee stage in the Lords
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Lord Howard of RisingConservative- Quote
- moved Amendment No. 31:
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Lord Evans of Temple GuitingLabour- Quote
- As we have heard from the noble Lord, Lord Howard, Amendments Nos. 31 and 32 seek to ensure that the non-executives are able to remove the executives from the board. Amendment No. 31 states that an executive member of the board should cease to be an executive member of the board if he is no longer employed by the board. This is unnecessary, as Clauses 3(6) and 5(2) make it clear that executive members of the board will always be employees of the board. Therefore, if an executive is no longer an employee, he cannot be on the board. To answer the noble Lord’s point, I am absolutely sure that if an executive ceases to be a member of the board and an employee but makes a valuable contribution, he can of course be rehired as a member of staff. Amendment No. 32 would allow the non-executives to remove executive members from the board by notice in writing, although this would not constitute cessation of employment by the board. Again, this is unnecessary as Clause 3(6) already enables this to happen.
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- Lord Howard of RisingConservative
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- I thank the Minister for what he has said and I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. [Amendment No. 32 not moved.]
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- Lord Howard of RisingConservative
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- moved Amendment No. 33:
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- Lord Evans of Temple GuitingLabour
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- As we have heard from the noble Lord, Lord Howard, Amendment No. 33 would remove the Minister for the Civil Service’s role in approving overall numbers of board employees. This provision was debated in the Public Bill Committee in the other place. However, for the benefit of noble Lords, we are happy to discuss it here, too. This provision of the Bill, requiring the approval of the Minister for the Civil Service as to the numbers and terms and conditions of employment of staff, is a fairly standard provision in legislation creating non-ministerial departments where staff will be civil servants. The purpose of the clause is to preserve cohesion across the Civil Service, subject to local delegations. A similar clause can be found, for example, in the Food Standards Act 1999 in respect of the Food Standards Agency. It does not mean that individual appointments will have to be brought before the Minister for the Civil Service, but rather that the Minister for the Civil Service will set general limits on numbers and guidance on terms and conditions of service. Before concluding my brief remarks on this group of amendments, I take this opportunity to flag up the fact that we may have to amend Clause 5 on Report. As it stands, Clause 5(7) provides for all employees of the board to be civil servants, whereas it has recently come to light that ONS employs some field work staff, who undertake surveys and other similar tasks, who are Crown servants. Work is ongoing, but our intention when the Bill was drafted was to ensure continuity of conditions for those staff currently employed by ONS. I will be sure to update noble Lords on our intentions in this regard as soon as I am able.
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- Lord Howard of RisingConservative
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- I thank the Minister for his comments. The clause refers as much to terms as it does to numbers. I still think that it is impossible to create a body with a board of directors and then appoint somebody else to tell them how to do their job, because one then has a civil servant, a board of directors and an executive director. Things do not work like that in the real world. I may wish to refer to this matter on Report. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn. Clause 5 agreed to. Clause 6 [Official statistics]: [Amendment No. 34 not moved.] Clause 6 agreed to. Clause 7 [Objective]:
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Baroness NoakesConservative- Quote
- moved Amendment No. 35:
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Lord Davies of OldhamLabour- Quote
- I should begin with an apology if I did not mention trust in the Second Reading debate. The Financial Secretary to the Treasury has said many times in the other place that the Government share what is no doubt the ultimate goal of the amendments tabled by the noble Baroness—that these reforms and this legislation will help to rebuild and bring greater public trust and confidence in official statistics. The problem with the amendments, as the noble Baroness will recognise, is that they translate an ambition that we all share and which I might add is important to the Bill into a statutory responsibility on the board for delivering high levels of public trust in its official statistics. We certainly look forward to the board successfully delivering exactly that but it is a different matter saying that it is accountable in statute for so doing. Amendment No. 35 places an obligation on the board to ensure high levels of public trust in official statistics. That is what we all hope for, but it may be an unreasonable obligation to place on it. The noble Lord, Lord Moser, who I am glad to see in his place, said at Second Reading: “Trust, however, is a complex matter. For one thing, trust in statistics is part and parcel of trust in government themselves, and, indeed, in politicians in general”.—[Official Report, 26/3/07; col. 1454.] That is a broad enough canvas to enable us to recognise that it may not be entirely fair to put such an obligation on the board by statute. How statistics are used and presented to people, especially via the media, plays a very important role in whether people do or do not trust official figures. Levels of numeracy and people’s understanding of figures and statistics are also likely to impact on their scepticism or otherwise of official statistics. People’s individual experiences of issues presented at an aggregate level by statistics also plays a part in their propensity to trust those statistics. We are all aware of the fact that these weaknesses can apply to ourselves. It is often said that politicians never take statistics more seriously than when they appear in opinion polls. However limited such snapshots may be, they become the stuff of media headlines. As we all know to our advantage or cost, politicians view them as conditioning elements in public behaviour. I again apologise for not emphasising the importance of trust in official statistics. However, it cannot be made a statutory obligation on the board to require it to achieve what it has only a role in helping to achieve. The amendment, which would require the board to carry out research on public trust in official statistics and publish the results of that work, reflects the fact that the ONS and the Statistics Commission do such work. They commission and undertake research in this important area. It is something the board is already empowered to do and we expect that it may well do it. However, the Government are reluctant to prescribe it in the Bill. It is better to leave it to the independent board to determine what activities it will undertake at different times to deliver its core objective, to promote and safeguard the quality and comprehensiveness of official statistics which serve the public good. Therefore, I hope that the noble Baroness will not press the amendment. Amendment No. 114 would provide an additional requirement regarding what issues must be covered in the board’s annual report—in this case, the issue of public trust in statistics. As I said, we do not think it necessary to over-prescribe how the board goes about its business. I do not think that it is helpful to state in detail what it must cover in its annual report. Clause 25 already requires the board’s annual report to cover what it has done and found each year. Within that remit surely we should allow the board to use its own judgment to ensure that the most pertinent and relevant information about its activities is reported each year. We share the objectives of the noble Baroness, but we do not need to be prescriptive in statute for the board to fulfil those highly desirable objectives.
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- 21:00
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- Baroness NoakesConservative
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- It is at least a relief to find that the Minister is now more relaxed about using the word “trust” in relation to statistics; we are clearly making progress. He has made great play of why the board should not be accountable for achieving trust. We must look at the barriers to achieving trust. In some of the amendments that we will reach in due course, we are asking for the board to be given the power to comment on statistics being misused. There is the very important issue of pre-release, which will get at one aspect of the handling of statistics that has engendered so much distrust of the Government. The Bill could be framed in such a way that it would be perfectly reasonable to ask the board to do things within its powers to achieve high levels of trust in public statistics, though I completely accept that, in its current form, it would be unreasonable to ask the board to do that. On the Minister’s objections to research, the Government are reluctant to prescribe having items specified for annual reports, as they say that that would not be helpful. However, those are not major objections to important issues that should be kept wholly within public view. I did not find the Minister’s overall response entirely satisfactory, although, as I said earlier, I am much encouraged by his ability to articulate the word “trust”. I shall have to read carefully what he said in his response before deciding what to do with the amendment on Report. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
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Lord DearingCrossbench- Quote
- moved Amendment No. 36:
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Lord NewbyLiberal Democrat- Quote
- Given that we supported the noble Lord’s earlier amendments, it is logical that we should support this one. The advantage of putting this phrase on the face of the Bill is that it would require the Statistics Board to take the local and regional tiers of statistics more seriously than it might otherwise. It also would make it easier for those who argue for greater resources for the production of statistics at those levels to make their case. We support the amendment.
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- Lord Davies of OldhamLabour
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- I am grateful to both noble Lords who have spoken in this short debate, particularly to the noble Lord, Lord Dearing, who attests to why a perspective that is wider than that of Whitehall can be of advantage. The Government stand by the statutory objective in the Bill. That objective is a cornerstone and is appropriate, succinct, broad and high level. It is a clear statement of the overall purposes of the board. The board must, “promote and safeguard … the quality … good practice … and … the comprehensiveness of official statistics”, that serve the public good. It is from that core objective that the board’s functions flow. I understand that emendations can be made to that in a number of ways. The noble Lord has made a persuasive case, but I do not think that we should specify that there should be local and national levels. The objective uses the term “public policy” to encompass the intention that official statistics should play a part in supporting an evaluation of policy at all levels. The noble Lord, Lord Dearing, indicated that “regional” might play its part between “local” and “national”. We think that “neighbourhood” or even “international” statistics might play their part in certain contexts, as well as “local”, “regional” and “national”. So, to be totally comprehensive, we could use phrases in the Bill that would detract from its precise core objective. I assure the noble Lord that the broad “public policy” objectives include local, regional and national objectives.
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- Lord DearingCrossbench
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- I thank the Minister. It would be nice to have that on the face of the Bill. I do not see how the amendment would subtract from it; it would clarify the intention. I look forward to resuming this discussion on another day. Meanwhile, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
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The Earl of NortheskConservative- Quote
- moved Amendment No. 37:
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- Baroness NoakesConservative
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- My name is added to the amendment and we support my noble friend, who is always capable of approaching a Bill in an entirely innovative way. His argument is that the reference to serving the public good, which includes informing the public about social and economic matters and assisting in the development of policy, treats the citizen as a mere object to be informed at and made policy about. My noble friend makes a very important point in saying that the Statistics Board should see statistics as having a much wider relevance than that. I hope that the Minister will see fit to meet the points that he has made.
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- Lord Davies of OldhamLabour
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- I shall not be any more receptive than I was on the preceding amendment, although I accept the intention behind the amendment, as I did with that moved by the noble Lord, Lord Dearing. However, when discussing his amendment, I was far too kind to say that I had noticed that a tail was coming up in the next amendment to add to the definition—and so we could go on. We want to leave the Bill as it is because it is precise, succinct and clear on what it establishes as the board’s objective. This amendment is another shot at clearly expressing an objective to which we all subscribe, but in fact it is unnecessary because the objective is already there. The board is charged with promoting and safeguarding the quality of statistics, which, as subsection (4) of the clause explains, includes accuracy and impartiality. The board is also obliged to promote and safeguard good practice, which includes accessibility. The other aspect of the amendment emphasised by the noble Earl is maintaining official statistics for the, “benefit of the individual citizen”. I agree that that is an important concept but it, too, is unnecessary. The Bill was amended in the other place to deal with the issue of “public good”. The precise sentiments expressed by the noble Earl were expressed in the other place, and the Government accepted the concept. However, we should emphasise that the objective was not just good government. Statistics play a very important part in that but they are also for the public good—for the good of the citizen. That point was taken on board by the Government in the other place. So we are at one on the objectives expressed by the noble Lord and supported by the noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, but we are determined to maintain the definition in the Bill, lest we leave ourselves open to the many fertile minds in all quarters of the Committee adding endless refinements to what is defined as being in the public good. I do not have the slightest doubt that there would be many, but they would not add to the inherent heart of the objective already stated in the Bill.
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Lord NorthbrookNon-affiliated- Quote
- I disagree with the Minister and support the amendment tabled by my noble friend Lord Northesk. Clause 7(2)(a) refers to giving information to the public about social and economic matters and paragraph (b) refers to, “assisting in the development and evaluation of public policy”. My noble friend’s amendment is a useful addition. I would like to focus on the transparency of statistics for the benefit of the individual citizen.
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- Lord Davies of OldhamLabour
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- I hear what the noble Lord says. He will recognise that preceding that is a clear definition of official statistics serving the public good. That point is all-embracing of those concepts.
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- The Earl of NortheskConservative
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- This issue is rather more important than the Minister suggests. Trust is a complex matter; it is all about perception. My difficulty, in a major sense, is that the Minister seems to start from a platform of saying that, in the generation of trust, perception does not matter. I believe that that approach is fundamentally flawed. I recall on a previous amendment that he was very disparaging—dare I say?—about the role that symbols play in the generation of trust. I am deeply dissatisfied with the Minister’s response, but I shall not press the issue at this time of night. I am fairly certain that I shall return to this point on Report, because unless the Government get their heads around the concept of trust and how perception plays into that concept, this will end up being the Bill that never barked. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
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- Baroness NoakesConservative
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- moved Amendment No. 38:
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- Lord Evans of Temple GuitingLabour
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- As we have heard, these amendments are about augmenting the board’s objective in Clause 7 and monitoring function in Clause 8, and deal with some issues raised by the previous amendments. We can understand some of the thinking behind these amendments, but they do not ultimately improve the objective are are not really necessary. As my noble friend said on the previous amendments, the objective as it stands is absolutely right. It is the cornerstone of the Bill and is appropriately succinct, broad and high level. It is designed to provide a clear statement of overall purpose for the board, stating that the board is to promote and safeguard the quality, comprehensiveness and good practice of official statistics that serve the public good. It is from this core objective that the board’s functions, which will allow it to deliver on the objective, flow. Amendment No. 38 would augment the board’s objective to state that the public good is served by statistics that meet, “the information needs of users of statistics”. In drafting the objective, particularly references to how statistics serve the public good, the Government knew that we could not exhaustively list all the ways in which statistics contribute. With that in mind, we included a brief statement of some of the key ways in which statistics serve the public good. The noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, added to this list with some interesting suggestions that we will consider before Report. The board’s objective also states that it is to promote and safeguard the quality, comprehensiveness and good practice of official statistics, including the accessibility, relevance and coherence of statistics. In fulfilling its objective and ensuring the relevance, coherence and comprehensiveness of statistics that serve the public good, the board will undoubtedly need to establish mechanisms to establish user interests and set about addressing them. We believe that the objective as drafted is clear and covers the right ground and we do not feel that the suggested amendment is necessary. Amendment No. 43 would require the board, in its duties at Clause 8, to keep under review whether official statistics meet users’ information needs. We have touched on some of these issues already in discussing the amendments that sought to add the requirement that the National Statistician should co-ordinate planning across statistics. Again, we do not think that such additions are necessary. To fulfil its objective, the board is already required to monitor, and can report on, the quality, including coherence, relevance and comprehensiveness, of official statistics. As part of that, it will no doubt engage extensively with a wide range of statistical users to establish and report on whether the suite of official statistics meets their needs. Again, I do not think that it is helpful to add additional requirements of the board, given this general policy statement. I hope that the noble Baroness is satisfied with the answers that I have given and invite her to withdraw her amendments.
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- Baroness NoakesConservative
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- Perhaps the Minister could answer my specific questions about a social capital index. I asked what was happening with the project on that and why we do not have a social capital index.
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- 21:30
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- Lord Evans of Temple GuitingLabour
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- I hope that I can. That was one of the things that I said that we would take away and think about. The information that I have is that the ONS carries out work on social capital, and has done since 2001. The board’s powers, including, at Clause 18, that to produce statistics, would enable it to produce additional work on social capital if necessary. I am told by officials that we will write to the noble Baroness to explain more and to answer any specific points that she has.
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- Baroness NoakesConservative
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- I am grateful that the Minister will write because people who have been in touch with me are particularly concerned about that. I see that those in the Box are smiling. They will do the letter for the Minister; it is not a problem. The Minister’s response was entirely predictable. Anything that these Benches suggest to improve the Bill and to keep the needs of persons such as users properly in view are regarded not as an improvement but as an unnecessary elaboration, or possibly even unhelpful. I will consider carefully what the Minister said. I look forward to the letter that his officials will draft for him on social capital and I will decide at that stage whether I shall return to this issue on Report. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
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- The Earl of NortheskConservative
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- moved Amendment No. 39:
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- Baroness NoakesConservative
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- My name is added to this amendment and I have nothing of substance to add to my noble friend’s remarks. It is important always to keep in mind data protection and the Bill is keen on data moving around. We will come to information clauses later in the Bill, but it would be helpful to have a reminder in the core of the Bill that data protection is important.
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- Lord Evans of Temple GuitingLabour
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- These amendments change the board’s objective. We have already discussed a number of amendments on this topic. Although I understand the thinking behind them, our view is that they do not ultimately improve the objective. We feel that they are unnecessary. The objective is the cornerstone of the Bill. We believe it to be clear in stating that the board is to promote and safeguard the quality, comprehensiveness and good practice of statistics that is serving the public good. It is from that core objective that the board’s functions which will allow it to deliver on the objective flow. Amendment No. 39 would add into the objective a requirement that the board ensures not only the accessibility of statistics, but appropriate data protection safeguards in respect of the raw data from which official statistics are derived. As I have explained in earlier discussions, the Government believe the objective is right as it is designed to provide a clear statement of the overall purpose of the board. It is the subsequent clauses that provide the details about the duties and powers the board has which it will deliver on that objective. These include the necessary restrictions on disclosure of personal information set out in Clause 36. As well as the specific restriction on disclosure of personal information in Clause 36, the board will more generally be required to comply with the requirements of the Human Rights Act 1998 and, in so far as the information is personal data, the Data Protection Act 1998. The Government take the view that it is not necessary to specify in each Bill past obligations which apply by virtue of the Data Protection Act 1998 and the Human Rights Act 1998. Furthermore, the ONS has a wide range of security protocols and mechanisms in place to protect raw statistical data. We fully expect that the board, and through it the executive office of the board as established by the National Statistician, would have similar operation controls in place, given that the board will need public confidence in its handling of data for its role to be fulfilled.
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- The Earl of NortheskConservative
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- I am grateful to the Minister for that reply, and grateful for the support of my noble friend on the Front Bench. On the basis of the Minister’s response, I could be tempted to believe that the Government believe that the objective of data protection and safeguards in respect of it can be shuffled into the background. That makes me distinctly uncomfortable, I am bound to say. I really do not want to return to the issue on Report, and in a sense the Minister is right that it is not incumbent necessarily that this provision should appear at this particular place in the Bill. But almost in a fit of pique, purely and simply because the Government seem to be so dismissive of the whole concept of data protection, I really would like to test the opinion of the Committee.
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- Lord Howard of RisingConservative
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- moved Amendment No. 41:
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- Lord NewbyLiberal Democrat
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- We have tabled a similar amendment in this group to reflect the concerns of the Royal Statistical Society, which feels that the Bill if anything weakens the current rules that enable a coherent framework to be established and implemented. The current framework for statistics requires the National Statistician to produce a high-level business plan for all national statistics, not only for statistics from the Office for National Statistics. There is no such requirement in the Bill, so there appears to be a weakening. I have no doubt that the Minister will say that this is yet another unnecessary amendment and that everything is fine. We beg to differ.
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Lord MoserCrossbench- Quote
- I shall briefly explain my strong support for Amendments Nos. 41 and 153. I put my name to Amendment No. 41, but I feel equally strongly about Amendment No. 153. They relate to two different issues. One relates to the United Kingdom, which will come up again in our discussions. The other relates to all departments, as has just been mentioned. I cannot stress sufficiently often how important this is. I repeat again that 80 per cent of statistics come from outside the ONS. Secondly, most of the problems are in outer departments, not in the ONS. The ONS rightly has a very high reputation across the world; the same is not true of a lot of departmental statistics. It is therefore absolutely crucial that the board, and indeed the National Statistician, have authority and responsibility across all government departments. As the Minister has said that he was going to think again about the precise definition of the board’s role in relation to the National Statistician, could he include in that rethinking strengthening the Bill further to ensure that the board, and of course the National Statistician, have adequate authority over departmental statistics?
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- Lord Davies of OldhamLabour
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- I am grateful to all noble Lords who have contributed to this short debate. The noble Lord, Lord Newby, was almost right when he anticipated that I would say that the Bill already strikes the right balance and therefore Amendment No. 41 would not be acceptable, but I am going to be slightly more assertive in my criticism of Amendment No. 153. So at least that will strike a fresh note, if only one of discord on which to conclude our debates today. Amendment No. 41 seeks to require the board to monitor, “the consistency of official statistics across government departments and across the United Kingdom”. The Government recognise that consistent UK-wide statistics are beneficial and often desirable. Such consistency means that statistics about the devolved countries can be combined, allowing figures to be produced for the whole of the United Kingdom and enabling the situation in the different administrations to be properly compared. I should note how pleased the Government are that the devolved administrations have all decided to join in with the new arrangements. However, there is bound to be some divergence between the different parts of the UK given the different political, legal and administrative systems and policies across the four nations, many of which pre-date the development of devolution. This means that it may not always be appropriate or desirable for statistics to be consistent. If any inconsistency has a material effect on the quality of statistics being produced, it will be a matter to be taken into account in the assessment of national statistics or as part of the board’s duty to monitor official statistics as already set out in Clause 8. The problem with Amendment No. 153, and I respect the support of the noble Lord, Lord Moser, for it, is that it would revert to old ways. It places this responsibility on the National Statistician when like a golden thread through all our debates today it will be clear that the Government have sustained their argument that it is the board’s responsibility in these terms, and to whom the National Statistician works. The board will be independent and it is important that it should be allowed to develop its own approach to these issues. It does not need specific mechanisms laid down in legislation. However, what is most important about Amendment No. 153 is that it addresses issues not to the board but to the National Statistician. The Government sustain their position that the board must have statutory responsibility for these matters. That is why I cannot accept either of the amendments. I am sorry to end on a note of disagreement on what has been a constructive day.
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- Lord Howard of RisingConservative
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- I thank noble Lords for their support. If the trust which has been discussed at such length today is to be created, power must be given. That is the underlying position of the amendment. Members on these Benches will support proposals to take another look at this issue with a view possibly to bringing it back on Report. Meanwhile, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
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- Lord Evans of Temple GuitingLabour
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- I beg to move that the House do now resume. Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to. House resumed. House adjourned at 9.58 pm.
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