Committee report calls for more openness from government about the Covid data underpinning its decisions
The government failed to provide sufficient explanation of the data underpinning key decisions during the Covid-19 pandemic, placing needless strain on public confidence, MPs have warned.
In a damning report, the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee said communication of data during the crisis has “not always been transparent enough, and accountabilities have been unclear”.
Ministerial accountability for ensuring decisions are underpinned by data has also been unclear, it said, with ministers passing responsibility between the Cabinet Office and the Department of Health and Social Care.
The Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee said government communications “must focus on informing the public openly and honestly”, including being “frank about uncertainties in the data”.
Building public confidence
“The British public must be commended for how it has risen to challenges that would be unimaginable in any other circumstance,” said committee chair William Wragg.
“Securing their trust is a crucial factor in the success of our response to the pandemic. For the government to build public confidence, it is absolutely vital that it is open on how it reaches its decisions and the data underpinning them.”
Michael Head, a senior research fellow in global health at the University of Southampton, added: “Given top-level decision-making can literally mean the difference between life and death during a pandemic, we do need transparency around policy and real-time access to the data that underpins those decisions.”
In the case of local lockdown and tiering decisions, the committee said data underpinning the decisions to put some areas under greater restrictions than others was not clear enough and there were no data thresholds aligned to the indicators for tiering decisions.
The committee has called on the government to publish thresholds for its roadmap out of lockdown “to avoid such confusion when decisions to move between steps are made”.
It has also recommended that when ministers quote statistics, the underlying data should be published and hyperlinks provided from ministerial statements to the data so it is easy for journalists and members of the public to find.
Local response
The committee also found that the local response to Covid-19 was delayed because Whitehall officials were unwilling to share data in sufficient detail and because data did not move quickly enough through new systems.
“Lessons must also be learnt on how the government shares information with local partners,” said Wragg.
“Delays in sharing vital data, and a reluctance to share detailed data almost certainly hampered the local response. This over-centralisation must not be repeated.”
The committee is now calling on the government to share all available data “in as much detail as possible with local officials” as it moves through the next steps of the roadmap. It also says the Department of Health and Social Care should undertake an urgent review of health data systems.
Government response
A UK government spokesperson said: “At every stage throughout the pandemic, the government has been guided by the latest scientific advice.
“As this report makes clear, the government has overseen a ‘remarkable effort pulling together data on Covid-19’ and ‘made much of this data and analysis available to the public’.
“We have published 77 sets of Sage [Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies] papers, and presented transparent data frequently at over 125 ministerial press conferences alongside scientific experts, offering direct scrutiny by the public and the media.”
They added that the government would respond fully to the report’s recommendations in due course.