§ Mr. StrawTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer (1) what guidance is given by the Head of the Government Statistical Service as to the maximum advance notice to be given to Ministers of the publication of regular statistical series; [18897]
(2) what advance notice Ministers are given of the publication of the main monthly economic statistical series. [18896]
§ Mr. Nelson[holding answer 18 April 19951]: The practice followed by the Central Statistical Office is set out in the open government White Paper, Cm 2290, and 408W was announced previously by the then Chancellor of the Exchequer. The code of practice for official statistics, a copy of which is in the Library, was released earlier this month by the Head of the Government Statistical Service.
Data are made available to all users at the same time, although Ministers, officials and the Governor of the Bank of England may receive copies of key statistical information at 5 pm two working days before publication on a strict need-to-know basis.
In the case of the retail prices index, although the main release of the RPI does conform to standard release practices, Treasury Ministers, named officials and the Governor of the Bank of England receive an early unpublished projection about a week in advance of the first release.