Recommendations

Recommendation 1: To protect public trust, support appropriate use, and strengthen independence in line with the Code, the lead officials should undertake and publish a clear evaluation of whether the Assessment of Salmon Stocks and Fisheries in England and Wales should be produced and published as official statistics. In doing so we suggest that they:

• Draw on the advice of the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) Head of Profession for Statistics.
• Apply Government Analysis Function guidance, on practical considerations when deciding to use the official statistics label, and publish a full evaluation and decision statement with the rationale against Trustworthiness, Quality and Value (TQV) and prominently link the published evaluation from the main statistics page.
• Embed orderly release practices: publish and maintain a 12-month forward publication schedule for these statistics, preannounce release dates, publish pre-release access lists where appropriate, and publish reasons for any date changes.
• Review related releases (e.g. Environment Agency salmonid and freshwater fisheries statistics) for potential official statistics status and publish outcomes to ensure a consistent approach across the family of outputs.

Recommendation 2: To maintain user confidence during changes to methods, reduce surprises, and ensure statistics continue to meet user needs, producer organisations should focus on improving the transparency of their communications around future developments. In doing so we suggest that they:

• Publish an accessible roadmap covering the methods/review programme and reporting changes – including milestones, the 2026 consultation, decision points, and delivery phases.
• Maintain a change log explaining any slippage (for example, the move from a 2025 to a 2026 consultation), with mitigations to sustain user confidence.
• Publish the scope of the 2026 consultation in advance, signalling key technical areas (e.g. rod exploitation rates, effort ratios, egg deposition rates) and flagging potential impacts on time series and data quality.
• Broaden reach beyond core user forums (e.g. smaller angling trusts and the wider public), report who was reached and how, and summarise consultation outcomes to demonstrate transparent decision‑making.
• Publish a methods change risk & assurance plan covering key risks (e.g., dependencies on angler‑reported catch/effort data), mitigations, external peer review/sensitivity testing, and post‑implementation review after the first new‑method release.

Recommendation 3: To further enable appropriate interpretation and reuse, ensure inclusivity, and be transparent about methods and uncertainty, producer organisations should prioritise making improvements to the clarity and accessibility of the statistics and supporting quality information. In doing so we suggest that they:

• Move key outputs to accessible HTML with a concise up-front summary; reduce reliance on long PDFs and provide clear navigation to methods and policy context (drawing on the Environment Agency’s HTML fisheries statistics as an example of a more accessible publication).
• Separate technical/methods materials from policy/legislative context into distinct, audience‑targeted documents, each short, task‑oriented and clearly signposted.
• Prominently highlight quality caveats (uncertainty, potential bias, data source strengths/limitations) in each release.
• Use OSR’s Administrative Data Quality Assurance Toolkit to structure quality assessments during the methods transition; document how data limitations are being addressed as methods evolve.
• Ensure any new data tools/portals (e.g. R‑Shiny‑style approaches) are compatible with assistive technologies, signpost related datasets/statistics from the main page, and include inline explanations of methods and quality.
• Continue and formalise provision of more‑timely provisional data via the Cefas portal with clear labelling (provisional vs final), versioning, and supporting documentation to aid appropriate interpretation and reuse.

Recommendation 4: To embed the Code, strengthen quality culture, and improve collaboration and challenge, producer organisations should focus on strengthening their engagement with users, sponsor departments and the wider Government Statistical Service. In doing so we suggest that they:

• Name a senior lead official/Head of Profession (HoP) sponsor for the cross‑organisation salmon statistics programme to coordinate Code compliance and oversee delivery during transition (including on orderly release).
• Engage actively with GSS networks and producer teams in other UK nations producing similar statistics to share and adopt good practice (methods, tools, accessibility, quality documentation).
• Appoint Code champions in each organisation to promote TQV, coordinate peer review and external challenge, and act as focal points for improvements.
• Consider how to make users central to decision‑making (e.g. a user reference group); record and publish how user input shapes content and methods – and where needs cannot be met, explain why.