§ Mr. Hayesasked the Minister for the Civil Service what progress has been made in implementing the recommendation in the "Review of the Government Statistical Services", Cmnd. 8236, that a code of conduct on the use of data for statistical purposes should be published.
§ Mr. HayhoeA White Paper "The Government Statistical Service Code of practice on the handling of data obtained from statistical inquiries" (Cmnd. 9270) has been laid before the House today, by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister.
The code, which has been approved by Ministers, formalises the existing arrangements for safeguarding the confidentiality of data obtained from statistical inquiries by the Government Statistical Service, and covers clerically handled and automatically processed data 387W concerning both people and undertakings. It has been published to make the public aware of the methods employed in statistical inquiries and to enable more statistical research to be undertaken in the universities and institutes instead of in the Civil Service.