Thank you for your letter updating us on your work to stabilise the ongoing collection of the LFS and APS. We welcome your plans for engaging with users to make a more in-depth assessment of the quality of the APS. Given the important use of these APS statistics, ONS must ensure that its analysis of the quality of APS-derived statistics is sufficient to enable the Scottish Government and Welsh Government, and other producers of APS-derived statistics, to reach a view on the quality of their APS-derived statistics.
Our Labour Market and Welfare domain team will continue to engage with your team on this matter. I am copying this letter to Rachel Skentelbery, Deputy Head of Profession for Statistics at ONS. Due to the Scottish Government’s and Welsh Government’s extensive use of APS outputs, I am also copying this letter to Alastair McAlpine, the Chief Statistician of Scotland and Stephanie Howarth, the Chief Statistician of Wales.
Yours sincerely
Mark Pont