Royal Statistical Society acclaims DfT

Story from Road Safety GB.

The DfT has been handed the Royal Statistical Society’s annual official statistics award, in part for including ‘honest appraisals’ over what can and cannot be concluded from its statistical releases.

Presented in conjunction with the UK Statistics Authority, the award aims to flag excellent examples of the use of stats by public bodies, with a particular focus on developments that improve the user experience.

The DfT’s road safety team provides regular updates on levels of personal injury and casualties recorded on Britain’s public roads. Its latest release, published in June 2016, has been lauded by the awards’ judges for pointing out that a 2% year-on-year fall in the number of people killed in accidents “is small enough that it can be explained by the natural variation in deaths over time”. The report also says “there is no evidence that the number of fatalities has changed over recent years”.

Jill Leyland, chair of the organising committee for the Official Statistics Awards, told Civil Service World, “The entry combined a clear appreciation of user need, interesting insights, thoughtful and innovative methodology and excellent communication including honest appraisals of the degree of statistical certainty or uncertainty. Work on the impact of weather on road accidents was particularly impressive and showed how good statistical thinking can draw out new, and sometimes counter-intuitive, conclusions from available data.”