Use Made of Official Statistics

1. Use Made of Official Statistics Use Made of Official Statistics: stage 1 Rosalyn Harper Royal Statistical Society 18 January 2007

2. Use Made of Official Statistics Research Outline • Objective - examine extent to which official statistics influence decision making in public and private organisations • Methods - literature review and interviews with users in public and private organisations • First in a two stage project

3. Use Made of Official Statistics Findings Overview: users’ experiences • Who are the users of Official Statistics? • What are Official Statistics used for? • What are the needs of users?

4. Use Made of Official Statistics Who are the users of Official Statistics? • Majority worked in an analytical role providing insights into specific areas • Expertise and confidence in using data sources/ statistics varied greatly • Implications for data provision

5. Use Made of Official Statistics What are Official Statistics used for? • Official Statistics used extensively, considered essential to good decision making • “…there won’t be a data series the ONS produce that we won’t have looked at and/or used regularly. Everything – you name it, we will scour everything – it’s our job to gain insight on the economy and then apply it to our business…”

6. Use Made of Official Statistics What are Official Statistics used for? • Census data • “…at the very local level, we can use it to understand business performance…we would understand better if a branch isn’t selling mortgages in a predominately elderly catchment, so we would hopefully target savers in that catchment…”

7. Use Made of Official Statistics What are Official Statistics used for? • National survey data • Administrative data

8. Monitoring Targeting Lobbying Internal research Resource allocation Planning services Bidding for funds Policy development Crime Statistics: User Perspectives Some examples of how used Use Made of Official Statistics

9. DATA SOURCE Administrative data Survey data Census USES Local Authorities Small Retailers Financial Services Statistics User Groups Trade Unions Lobby Groups Insurance Industry Tourism & Utilities Leisure Environmental Groups Market Research Supermarkets Charities USERS • Resource allocation • Policy development • Lobbying Bidding • Marketing • Evaluation Targeting Planning Services • Marketing Monitoring • Internal Research

10. Use Made of Official Statistics Users’ Needs: timeliness “…timeliness is an issue because Government has a bit of an obsession with being as close to 100% accurate as you could possibly be. The hard reality is it’s a trade off between speed and accuracy and from a commercial perspective there is probably too much accuracy and not enough speed. I accept that accuracy’s a good thing – but not at any cost…”

11. Use Made of Official Statistics Users’ Needs: accessibility • Simplify the data structure • Use common ‘keys’ like ONS OAC

12. Use Made of Official Statistics Users’ Needs: better planning • Government set targets but perception of little planning on how to measure or collect the data • “…you have your little old lady who sits in the cold. Well, we don’t know if she’s little, we don’t know she’s old, we don’t know she’s poor and we don't know she’s sitting in the cold, so how do we know that we should be targeting her…”

13. Use Made of Official Statistics Next steps • Larger study of use made underway (MORI) • Publication of Commission Report Spring 2007 • Investigation of the public value of official statistics

14. Use Made of Official Statistics Separate research project on Accessibility • Objectives - consider the accessibility of online official statistics, including retrievability, quality, format and the needs of users. • Methods - mystery shopper approach, review of policies

15. Use Made of Official Statistics Contact details • rosalyn.harper@statscom.org.uk • abigail.armstrong@statscom.org.uk • www.statscom.org.uk