Ed Humpherson to Scott Heald – Update on temporary suspensions of accreditation: Scottish Health Costs, breast cancer screening statistics, cervical cancer screening statistics, and Learning Disability Statistics Scotland
Dear Scott,
Update on temporary suspensions of accreditation: Scottish Health Costs, breast cancer screening statistics, cervical cancer screening statistics, and Learning Disability Statistics Scotland
Thank you for your letter of 24 August requesting the cancellation of accreditation for the above-named statistics produced by Public Health Scotland (PHS). I previously agreed to the requests to temporarily suspend the status of these statistics as accredited official statistics. Thank you for also providing an update on the development work underway on each of the statistics.
I agree with your request to cancel the accreditation for all the above-named statistics. I have provided more detail on my decision in the attached annex. My team will be happy to discuss the most appropriate timing for any future reviews of these statistics once development work has progressed and you are assured that the outputs comply fully with the Code of Practice for Statistics.
For completeness, I am copying this letter to Alistair McAlpine, Scottish Government Chief Statistician; Anita Morrison and Nicola Edge, Heads of Health and Social Care Analysis, Scottish Government; Tasmin Sommerfield, National Clinical Advisor/Deputy Director of Screening, PSD; Alexander Cruikshank, Team leader National Screening Programmes, Scottish Government; and Ruth Callandar, Scottish Consortium for Learning Disability.
Yours sincerely,
Ed Humpherson
Director General for OSR
Annex
Scottish Health Services Costs (the “Costs Book”)
We agree with your request to cancel the accreditation of the Scottish Health Services Costs statistics, following the suspension of accreditation in February 2026.
Owing to the ongoing implementation of the Patient Level Information and Costing System as a new data source alongside ongoing quality improvement work, it is appropriate that these statistics are published with official statistics in development status.
We have published guidance on producing Official Statistics in Development to support producers in communicating changes clearly and transparently. In line with our guidance, producers should publish a development plan which outlines what development is needed, what the development involves, and importantly when the development is expected to be delivered.
We note that PHS is providing users with clear explanations about the statistics’ limitations and is working with the PHS Statistical Governance team to implement improvements.
Breast cancer screening
We agree with your request to cancel the accreditation of the breast cancer screening statistics, following the suspension of accreditation in February 2026.
The publication of new statistics continues to be paused, and we note that the timeline for securing a new data source for these statistics is currently unknown. This delay to publication, alongside the need for a new data source which was not considered in the original accreditation, means that it is appropriate to now cancel the accreditation.
We welcome your transparent approach to keeping users informed of the status of these statistics and the ongoing work to resolve data quality issues.
Cervical cancer screening
We agree with your request to cancel the accreditation of the Scottish cervical screening programme statistics, following the suspension of accreditation in May 2025.
We note that work to incorporate all six key performance indicators (KPIs) now being used to monitor the Scottish cervical screening programme has been delayed by data supply issues. As it will not be possible to incorporate all KPIs in time for the forthcoming 2025/26 release due in November, we agree that publishing the statistics as official statistics is now appropriate.
OSR and PHS discussed previously that a compliance review of these statistics would be valuable, and my team will engage with you about a suitable time for us to carry out this work once all six KPIs are incorporated.
Learning Disability Statistics Scotland
We agree with your request to cancel the accreditation of the Learning Disability Statistics Scotland (LDSS), following the suspension of accreditation in December 2021.
These statistics had their accreditation suspended in 2021 owing to data quality concerns and they were subsequently transferred from the Scottish Consortium for Learning Disability (now the Scottish Commission for People with Learning Disabilities, SCLD) to PHS. We note that PHS is planning a new statistical release which includes learning disabilities data collected through Source Social Care, and that this initial publication will be developmental and have less detail than was reported previously, although will still be filling an important data gap. We welcome that PHS intends to involve users in the developments which will inform this publication.
Within this context, it is appropriate that the accreditation of the previous LDSS is now cancelled.