At OSR, we support good evidence that informs the public.
Our main focus is on official statistics. But we also recognise the role that evaluation plays in providing insight into what works in government policies and programmes.
That’s why we welcome the brand new Evaluation Registry, launched by the Evaluation Task Force in March 2025. The site will provide a single home for evaluations across Government.
There is at present a lot of great evaluation work taking place across Government led by researchers, economists and other analysts. They are commissioned by their department to look at what’s being done, and to create an evidence base that helps refine, improve and challenge policy.
The issue with this, though, is twofold. First, it can be difficult to know where to find and access evaluation evidence. That in itself is a huge pity. It means that the good evaluation that gets done can sometimes languish in obscurity, and the knowledge it represents may not be accessible to a wide range of people. This inaccessibility is also not in line with the intelligent transparency that we advocate in OSR – it can help underpin public confidence if the evidence that informs decisions is made fully available.
The second issue is that there is scope to increase the coverage of evaluations across Government. In 2019, the Prime Minister’s Implementation Unit reported that only 8% of the Government Major Projects Portfolio had robust evaluation plans in place (here’s a link to the report). This has now increased to 34% in the 2023/34 GMPP portfolio (here’s a link to the report), however, there is still considerable work to be done to improve the quality and quantity of evaluation on our Government’s most complex and strategically significant projects. By making the process and practice of evaluation more transparent, the website will drive greater commissioning and take-up of evaluations.
As the Evaluation Task Force’s blog published today says, the Evaluation Registry brings together evaluation plans and reports in a single, accessible site – which as of June 2025, already contains over 1750 entries!
We have a strong partnership with the Evaluation Task Force and we will work in partnership with them to support high quality evidence. In particular, while the Evaluation Task Force will maintain and oversee the Registry, the Office for Statistics Regulation will engage with Departments where there are delays in publishing evaluations. In this way, we will support transparency and access to the knowledge base provided by evaluations. And our partnership with the Evaluation Task will support Departments to use the Evaluation Registry, and thereby provide maximum value to the public.
As my blog from March 2022 states, we love evaluation in OSR. So we’re delighted to be able to support the advent of the Registry.
Related links: The Evaluation Registry: a new home for Government evaluation