Today we have published our business plan and regulatory work programme for 2019/20, along with updates to the National Statistics list and our publications calendar.

We hope the business plan will give you a sense of our ambition over the coming years and through the associated work programme provides details of specific projects we plan to undertake during 2019/20. The work programme is not a comprehensive list of everything we will do this year, it sets out projects we have committed to while retaining the flexibility to address new priorities and respond to emerging issues.

Our enduring aim is to see statistics serve the public good and for people to have confidence in statistics produced by government: confidence that the statistics published are an accurate reflection of what they aim to measure and confidence that the statistical system will provide the statistics needed to support public discourse and inform decision makers.

To support this aim, during 2019/20 we will focus on enhancing the trustworthiness, quality and value of key statistics, including through assessments of important outputs such as Labour Market Statistics and Hospital Activity Statistics. We will continue to promote voluntary adoption of the Code of Practice for Statistics and we will also work closely with others to identify and share research on the public impact of statistics, develop our understanding of public good, and to emphasise the importance of statistical leadership.

We are grateful to all those who have engaged with us as we have reviewed our priorities and developed our work programme. This is part of an ongoing dialogue which we hope will continue. Over the summer, we will be seeking input into our longer-term strategy – watch this space for more details! In the mean time if you have any comments on the work programme – such as views on whether we are assessing the right statistics and if our systemic review programme has the right focus – or comments on any of the other documents published today we would welcome them at any time. You can email regulation@statistics.gov.uk or contact one of the team. We will publish updates to our work programme each quarter, providing information on new projects added, and the status of existing projects (e.g. planned, live or completed).

This is an exciting time in the development of statistics and data and we believe we have a central role in championing good practice and supporting improvement so that statistics serve the public good. We welcome your ongoing interest in what we do and hope that you will continue to be part of the dialogue as we develop our vision and work programme.