National Statistics Board
Minutes
Venue: Department of the Taoiseach
Date: Wednesday 30 July, 2014
The following members attended:
Dr. Patricia O’Hara (Chairperson), Mr. Tom Geraghty, Ms. Rowena Dwyer, Dr. Helen Johnston, Mr. Gerard O’Neill, Mr. John Callinan, Mr. John McCarthy and Mr. Pádraig Dalton.
Ms. Jennifer Banim and Mr. Joe Treacy were also in attendance. Mr. Donal Kelly acted as Secretary.
Item 1: Minutes of May 20 2014 (NSB 2014/4/2)
The minutes of the previous meeting were accepted without amendment.
Item 2: Director General’s progress report (NSB 2014/4/3)
The Director General briefed the Board on a number of recent developments within CSO and at European level.
Move to ESA 2010 and BPM6 |
The CSO published the Q1 2014 National Accounts on the new ESA 2010 basis on July 3rd, in advance of the September 2014 target set by Eurostat. Government Finance Statistics and Sectoral Accounts will be published before end-July, completing the move of all CSO's quarterly macro-economic results to the ESA 2010 standards. |
Environment Statistics |
The Environmental Indicators Ireland 2014 biennial publication was released on 28th May and the new quarterly Building Energy Ratings (BER) release was published on July 15th. The BER release is based on detailed data available from SEAI on domestic properties and work is in progress with SEAI to extend the results to cover commercial properties. |
Framework Regulation for Business Statistics (FRIBS)
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In June 2014 Eurostat had proposed to finalise much of the discussion around the FRIBS regulation but member states were not satisfied that their concerns were being addressed. To highlight these concerns Ireland and 13 other member states agreed to send a letter to Eurostat in advance of the meeting to suggest an alternative course of development, emphasising the need for adequate assessments of proposals around micro-data sharing and profiling. The signatories to the letter proposed that the global value chains related elements should be separated from the remainder of FRIBS to allow FRIBS to continue on its proposed timeline (adoption in 2016 with implementation in 2017/2018). Eurostat are resistant to this idea as it threatens to add significantly to the timeline but the issues involved are complex and potentially very costly for member states. |
Construction 2020
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Construction 2020 outlined an action to develop a National Housing Framework. A substantial element of this will be developing the suite of information needed to inform policy on the housing market, particularly in the context of housing supply and demand. The CSO is heavily engaged with the development of material for the implementation group and is working to ensure that a realistic plan is put in place to develop the set of indicators required. It was noted that the new information required will have resource implications for CSO. |
Household Survey Development (HSD) Project |
The Request For Tender (RFT) for the outsourcing of CATI (Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing) will issue on the eTenders and OJEU (Official Journal of the European Union) websites on Wednesday July 30th 2014. The tender is for the provision of services to perform CATI for waves 2-5 of the Quarterly National Household Survey (QNHS). At present all QNHS interviewing is done on a face to face basis, however under the new environment wave 1 (first call) will continue to be performed using field staff while waves 2-5 will be delivered by an outsourced call-centre. |
Comprehensive Review of Expenditure (CRE) |
Since the May NSB meeting, the CSO has submitted its response to the Comprehensive Review of Expenditure. The essence of the CSO's response is that there is no scope for cuts in the existing allocation for 2015 to 2017 without incurring serious systemic risks for Ireland in relation to EU compliance. The CSO does not control its obligatory work programme, which is predominantly set by Eurostat and the ECB in the context of EU statistical legislation. These EU demands are increasing rapidly, as are national demands for statistics. |
European Statistics Code of Practice (ES CoP) Peer Review |
The Eurostat peer review of the CSO and Irish Statistical System has been scheduled for the week of 23-27 March 2015 (subject to final confirmation). The review team will visit CSO that week and meet management, staff and a wide range of stakeholders - users of statistics, data providers, media, public bodies, researchers etc. . |
The Board discussed the new data demands arising from Construction 2020 and welcomed CSO’s engagement with policy makers around specific data needs. It was suggested that this type of engagement could be a useful pathfinder for the challenge of linking policy with specific data needs in the future. The Board requested regular updates from this process.
The Board welcomed the progress being made on the Household Survey Development project and in particular looked forward to the development of monthly labour market and household budget indicators as the project progresses. The Board also welcomed the efforts being made by CSO to make greater use of Live Register administrative data to improve data related to Labour Market dynamics.
There was some discussion of the forthcoming European Statistical System Peer Review of official statistics in Ireland and its implications for CSO and other producers of official statistics in Ireland. CSO pointed out that in the future these reviews were likely to become more frequent and adopt a more audit-like approach in their dealings with national statistical institutes.
Item 3: Update on CSO resources (NSB 2014/4/4)
The Director General provided an update on the current CSO budgetary and staffing situation. He described a difficult resource situation facing the Office at the moment, in the context of the Comprehensive Expenditure Review, increasing data demands including Construction 2020, and staff retirements and departures. He outlined the difficulties faced by CSO in continuing to meet its regulatory obligations in this context and described the efforts being made by CSO to mitigate the short-term risks and devise a sustainable long-term solution.
There was a comprehensive discussion about the resource situation facing the CSO and the Board considered what role it might play given its responsibility under the Statistics Act to assess the resources necessary for the compilation of official statistics. Following a wide-ranging discussion where a number of alternatives were explored the Board agreed to maintain a watching brief for the time being and encouraged CSO to continue its efforts to find a solution and to provide ongoing updates to the Board.
Item 4: Update on ISS Code of Practice (NSB 2014/4/5)
The Director General outlined the progress that has been made in the implementation of the ISS COP since it was launched in November 2013.
He pointed out that while the Statistics Act confers some powers on the Director General of the CSO in relation to statistical matters across the wider public sector it does not enable the DG to require compliance with national or international standards in the production of official statistics. Therefore, the implementation of the COP across the public sector must be on the basis of an understanding by all of the value accruing from adherence to the COP.
He pointed out that the forthcoming ES COP Peer Review will somewhat hamper the progress that can be made in the implementation of the ISS Code of Practice in the short-term. However, in the next 12 months the CSO will focus on engaging with some public sector organisations to pilot elements of the ISS COP process, will develop a national peer review process for the producers of official statistics and develop documentation to support public sector organisations who wish to implement the COP.
Item 5: System of Health Accounts
Jennifer Banim (Assistant Director General, CSO) provided the Board with an update on the ongoing work on the System of Health Accounts, describing the positive engagement between the CSO, the Department of Health and the Health Service Executive. The first transmission of SHA results to Eurostat is scheduled for Q2 2015 on a voluntary basis, with transmission of SHA required under regulation by April 2016. However, the 2015 transmission is dependent on the continued commitment of all the project partners to the time lines in the project plan.
Collection of data from private hospitals and health insurers by the CSO will start in Q3 2014. A Statutory Instrument for the survey of private hospitals has been finalised and the survey will go live in the coming weeks. A survey instrument for health insurers is being finalised in consultation with industry representatives.
The ADG described the efforts being made to collate the available public sector health data and to use administrative data where available. However, the availability of local level expenditure data, access to relevant private sector data and issues mapping national data to the EU SHA classification are likely to be an ongoing feature of the project.
Item 6: NSB Strategy – next steps (NSB 2014/4/6)
The Chairperson outlined the work that has been done so far in preparation for the new Board strategy, including meetings with individual Board members and key external stakeholders. She thanked the members of the Board their time and contributions so far. The Chairperson outlined some of the key areas that will form the basis of the new strategy, including the evolving role of the CSO, the importance of a public-sector information strategy, the advent of Big Data and the role of the ISS Code of Practice.
A first draft of the new strategy will be circulated prior to the next Board meeting.
Item 7: Any other business
The Board noted the departure of Mr. Kieran Walsh (Director, Business Statistics) who will leave CSO in October to take up a position as Senior Statistician in the Statistics Department of the International Labour Organisation in Geneva. The Board thanked Kieran for his contribution to CSO and wished him well in his new role.
The next meeting of the National Statistics Board will be held on Thursday October 2nd in the Central Statistics Office, Cork.