Don’t Tell Him, Pike!
First as comedy, then as tragedy, isn’t it?
Britons could be forced to give details of their jobs, earnings and health status to officials as a slump in responses to surveys undermines Whitehall’s ability to judge the state of the economy.
Professor Denise Lievesley, who ran a major review of statistics for the Government, said the proposal could ensure that Britain’s economic data – which is critical to making decisions on policies including interest rates – could be relied upon.
Members of the public can currently be fined £1,000 if they fail to complete the census, while businesses which refuse to complete surveys for the Office for National Statistics can be taken to court and charged £2,500.
However, there is no such incentive to fill in the Labour Force Survey (LFS). A plunge in response rates to the vital questionnaire since the pandemic has left the Treasury, the Bank of England and City economists struggling to gauge the strength of the jobs market, the risks to inflation and the health of the wider economy.
The census was completed by 97pc of households in 2021. By contrast only around one fifth of those approached for the jobs market survey responded, a share which has fallen by roughly half since the pandemic struck.
Don’t tell ‘em.
Sir John Cowperthwaite, when Financial Secretary to Hong Kong, refused to allow anyone to even collect the GDP statistics. On the grounds that if they existed some damn fool would only want to do something with them. He also presided over the rise of one of the world’s poorest, resourceless economies to one of the very richest on the planet. By, essentially, telling government to bugger off except for those things that really, really, must be done by government. The rule of law, no actual starvation even if inequality was massive and so on. Just create the basic structures that allow everyone to then get on with things - and get on with them they will and get on with them they did too.
“Don’t tell him” is regularly voted one of the top two British jokes ever (the other is Delboy falling through the bar and they regularly change 1 and 2 spots over different counts) and we are a nation noted for our humour. At which point we should simply get more Cowperthwaitian upon our own governors. If we allow them to collect this information then they’ll just do some damn fool thing with it - or perhaps some damn fool will try to etc. So, reduce the temptation for them to display their foolery and we shall all be better off.
An interviewer will contact you to arrange a suitable time to conduct the interview.
Questionnaire data are collected face to face and over the telephone using computer-assisted questionnaires.
During the interview we will collect information about the circumstances of the whole household and will ask you questions on a range of topics, for example, health, looking after the family and home, employment status, education and training opportunities.
No, really really. Man comes around with a clipboard trying to insist upon a legal right to answers to intrusive, personal, questions? Most unBritish. We simply do not do the “Your pappers plz” thing. It always astonishes J Foreigner when it’s explained that a British policeman does not have the right to even ask your name, let alone what you’re doing in a particular place. “Going about my lawful business, Constable” is a full, legal and complete response to such an impertinence.
Don’t tell ‘em, Peeps. We’ve quite enough damn foolery already.
Tim Worstall