In our second petition Debbie & I call upon the House of Commons to accept the Recommendations of The Work & Pensions Select 3rd Report Monitoring the Perfomance of DWP 2012/13 and the Public Administration Committee 1st Report and Ensures Minsters and others present statistics in a way that is fair, accurate and “unspun”.
Today the Government’s response to the report is out; unsurprisingly Government is general agrees with the recommendations but not without denying the DWP doesn’t already do this?
Governments response includes many claims:
DWP is very careful about the language used when referring to benefit claimants, making clear that it is the system itself that has for too long trapped people into a life of welfare dependency.
DWP statistical releases are produced and published separately to and independently… Great care is taken by our statisticians to ensure the statistical releases are.. balanced and impartial…
statements are cleared… for their statistical integrity. (Italics are MY emphasis)
The report goes on to agree that Government statistics should be presented in a way that is fair, accurate and “unspun” and states “the DWP should avoid feeding into negative public views about people who receive benefits, and that statistics should be used objectively to shed light on policy implementation, not to prop up established views and preconceptions“; then in conclusion comes more claims:
Since May 2010 the DWP has led the way in openness and transparency of statistical releases by publishing over 730 releases and datasets.
The Department ensures that all its statistics are of high quality, impartial and issued in an open and transparent manner, free from political interference and according to the Code of Practice for Official Statistics.
Following a request from UKSA the Department introduced procedures for the publication of ad hoc statistical analyses in 2010. We have also developed a dissemination tool, Stat-Xplore, which allows the wider statistical audience to interrogate our statistical data
So there we have it, the House of Commons agreed statistics should be presented in a way that is fair, accurate and “unspun”; and continues to claim the DWP does this already! Does this sound like the Government and DWP are admitting they have been spinning statistics; and, even with this acceptance of the recommendations will they start telling the truth about the catastrophe’s of the DWP and STOP the SPIN?
We don’t think so therefore we’ve decided to amend the petition to read –
House of Commons implement the Recommendations of The Work & Pensions Select 3rd Report Monitoring the Perfomance of DWP 2012/13 and the Public Administration Committee 1st Report and Ensures Minsters and others STOP SPINNING THE STATS.
Join the TRUTH Campaign Sign the #NOWPetition and #ImpeachDWP
.
jaynelinney 