Yesterday I wrote about Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling’s extraordinarily twisted use of statistics to try to justify part of the Conservatives’ ‘Broken Britain’ narrative.
Today the BBC’s Mark Easton, who broke the original story, has the news that Chris Grayling has just been sent a sharp letter from Parliament’s statistics watchdog, informing him that his mis-use of statistics about violent crime is ‘likely to damage public trust in official statistics’. The Chairman of the UK Statistics Authority (UKSA), Sir Michael Scholar, says he does ‘not wish to become involved in political controversy’, but ‘must take issue’ with Grayling’s comments ‘yesterday about violent crime statistics’.
The ‘monitoring and assessment note’ from the UKSA is politely scathing about Grayling’s false comparisons of violent crime since the Labour government came to power in 1997, stating
‘We regard a comparison, without qualification, of police recorded statistics between the late 1990s and 2008/09 as likely to mislead the public’ and concluding
‘The evidence from the BCS [British Crime Survey] is that there has not been an increase in respondents’ experience of violent crime between the late 1990s and 2008/09′.
So how much longer can Grayling continue to ‘airbrush‘ statistics, or will he now accept he’s been ‘shopped‘?
You can read the full texts of the letter and accompanying note on Mark Easton’s blog.
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9 Comments
I think the Labour government has habitually used skewed statistics so excessively for so long nobody believes any official statistic any more. As GVic Reeves once said, “97% of statistics are made up”.
There is a clear difference between choosing data that tells your story, and stating a clear intention to make up data that will ‘prove’ your prejudices (and even making false claims of ‘official’ status). Grayling has overstepped the mark by a long way. He is not fit for office and should be removed from his shadow post.
As someone with a degree in Maths with a large part done in statistics its very frustrating how often statictics are misquated, misunderstood or even deliberatly misused.
These statitics clearly stated that they were not comparable yet that is exactly what Grayling chose to do. He should appologise for misleading the electorate or be forced out by Caeron, then people might start to regain a little bit of trust in statisics used by Politicians.
@ John,
And do the government’s claims to have reduced crime not rest on the exclusion from figures of crimes committed by under sixteens.
That Grayling is unfit for office is a moot point. He is a Conservative. He may have oversteped the mark but is the Government’s claim that unemployment has fallen any less dishonest when the statistically insignificant drop of 7000 on a total of 2.5 million is known to be doe to people leaving the register rather than be forced into degrading jobs under threat of having benefits suspended. Is the statistical “return to growth” any less dishonest when the 0.1% growth recorded for the last perriod has only come as a result of the Government’s pumping vast amounts of fiat money into the economy.
Nobody has ever or will ever trust ststistics. Have you never heard there are three kinds of lies; lies, damned lies and statistics. I had a long and successful career in Information Technology and I know statistics can always be manipulated to give the required answer.
Come on guys, this is Lib Dem voice not Aren’t New Labour Lovely. If the party wants to hold on to its present position and possibly wing a sackful of new sears at the election it is necessary to attract Labour votes. That will onloy happen if Liberal Democrats attack Labour’s record rather than focusing on the Tories.
@Ian
I am defending no-one. Perhaps you didn’t hear Grayling on the Today programme where he was reminded of the statisticians’ criticism. He heard it, dismissed it, and mad it clear that he would continue to use those figures in that way because they ‘showed’ what he believed. If he does that in office, and there is no reason to suppose that he wouldn’t, then his *decisions* (not just his excuses to the public after the fact) will be, to say the very least, suspect. We don’t want a pig-headed Home Secretary riding roughshod over any evidence presented to him. He is simply not fit for office.
As for needing to attack Labour rather than the Tories: didn’t that happen the last few elections and get nowhere? Surely there is a need to attack the policies that are wrong and those that support those policies. That means attacking both. In any case I’m wary of hiding this as ‘a plague on both your houses’. Grayling has gone a long step beyond anyone else and it’s him that needs reigning in.
Typical standard lib dem hypocrisy – the Lib Dems have been happy to use the same figures for years…
http://guythemac.com/2010/02/03/utter-lib-dem-hypocrisy-over-crime-stats/
Bill
@ John,
Grayling interpreted the figures to suppport his case but the way in which the official figures are presented has been changed to justify Labour’s claim to have reduced crime. No I did not hear Grayling, life is too short to waste on boring, Labour biased drivel like Today. Whenever I have heard any of that programme I have heard Liberal Democrats, Nationalists, Conservatves and Ukippers being cross examined as they should be and Labour ministers beeing spoon fed soft questions and allowed to answer with blatant lies.
When voters make up their minds who to support, because both interpretations of statistics are not borne out by their experience and perception then the statistics will not be believed. Because I am or was a Liberal (I’ve never actually been a member of the Lib Dems) my view is that neither Conservative nor Labour are fit for office. So why bother yourself with them. Grayling took a lie, twisted it and made it into another lie. It is what governments and oppositions do and has ben going on since the Greeks invented democracy. If the Liberal Democrats are elected I expect them to do the same but with better results.
It is not the job of Liberal Democrat members and supporters to advise David Cameron how to run his party. So when a Labour government says “Look, we have reduced this type of crime,” and everybody knows the result has been achieved by changing the way we count crimes what is the point of attacking to Tories for making political capital out of by giving a different but equally false interpretation of the information.
The electorate want something different, not the same old nit picking and point scoring? What voters want to know is what the Liberal Democrats will do to tackle crime. If all you are going to say is “Well Labour have done a good job really,” you migh as well tell them they would be better off voting Labour.
If Liberal Democrats don’t like the rough and tumble of politics perhaps they should withdraw from the game. Nice people don’t win elections. Forget Grayling, tell the public how a Nick Clegg government will tackle clearing up the terrible mess Labour have made of law and order. If people like what they hear it will win votes.
I recall from my days as a county council candidate the frustration with the party people used to express. One strand of opinion complained it was impossible to know what Liberals stod for as they were always trying to ride two horses with one arse (as Cyril Smith used to put it.)
Ian – “Grayling interpreted the figures to suppport his case but the way in which the official figures are presented has been changed to justify Labour’s claim to have reduced crime.”
You are speaking like a Tory. The official figures don’t belong to any party; they paint a picture. But they don’t paint the picture of comparisons over the period that Grayling chose. There are figures available that do that but those don’t toe the Tory line. By all means oppose the government but don’t do so on the back of lies – that’s a Tory error.
“So when a Labour government says “Look, we have reduced this type of crime,” and everybody knows the result has been achieved by changing the way we count crimes”
Not true.
They have changed the way violent crime is counted – and that count has gone up. The totally independent count that hasn’t changed its method also shows that violent crime has gone down by 50%. If you really support LibDem values then you should be avoiding those lies. Of course if you want to support someone who brings crime down then perhaps you should be voting Labour! 😉
Of course there are many more issues (and many more within law and order): but lets keep the criticisms based on honest figures and not follow the Tory line.
John,
I follow my own line and the advice of The Buddha. “”Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense.”
I follow that advice and overwhelmingly it is proved right. I mentioned that the real fraud in all Labou’s claims to have reduced crime lies in the fact that crimes committed by under sixteens are not included in the statistics. This explains why people’s perceptions of crime are so different from official statistics. As a Liberal I support individual freedom and that includes the freedom of people who live on or near sink estates to beable to live their lives without harassment from cangs of people to young to commit crimes (but old enought to kick por Gary Newlove to death)
If your views are typical John the Liberal Democrats will be reduced to an irrelevant rump at the election. Fortunately I know that up here in the north at least there are plenty of Liberal Democrats who have a firmer grip on reality and know that official statistics and the type of politicians who hide behind them are despised.
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