European support to the President of ELSTAT and independence of statistical authorities
26 May 2015
The European Statistical System Committee (ESSC) opposed interventions in independence of national statistical authorities. From its position of a supervisory body it stated that the production of European statistics is in compliance with the highest professional standards. Thus, it supported the Hellenic Statistical Authority, ELSTAT, the President of which faces accusation due to the alleged manipulation with data on the budget deficit of Greece.
The ESSC by its statement adopted last week in Luxembourg (full wording here) acknowledged clear improvements of the Greek statistical system during the past five years. It stated that Greek deficit and debt data have been consistently published by Eurostat without reservations or amendments since November 2010 despite ELSTAT has to intensively fight to maintain its independence.
“It is actually a paradoxical situation. Who is to be brought to the court is the President of the national statistical office that proceeded in compliance with European legislation and that represented regained independence of Greek statistics. His case is a warning for the entire European Union and developed democracies. Therefore, the ESSC adopted a statement, in which it strongly appeals to independence of national statistical authorities and protects their immunity against political influences and any efforts of governments to dictate the form of official statistics. Such interventions are absolutely unacceptable and would mean an end to standards of quality and credibility of European statistics,” the President of the Czech Statistical Office, Iva Ritschelová, who is also a member of the ESSC, said.
Andreas V. Georgiou was appointed President of the newly established independent ELSTAT office in 2010. Soon afterwards he announced that the deficit of the Greek budget in 2009 was 15%, not 12%. A former employee of the Office accused him of purposive worsening of data which, according to her opinion, had been motivated by the need to justify international surveillance and budget cuts on the expenses side. The European statistical office (Eurostat) has repeatedly stood up for ELSTAT. It has officially confirmed that data provided by the Hellenic Statistical Authority are in compliance with the Eurostat methodology.
The standpoint of the ESSC is aimed at statistics in the entire Europe and appeals for maintaining of professional independence of statistical authorities and credibility of statistics. It arises from a recent groundbreaking Regulation (EU) 2015/759 of the European Parliament and of the Council, which came into force on 29 April 2015. The Regulation entitles national statistical authorities to have fast and free approach to administrative data sources kept, for example, by ministries. Thanks to that, state statistical systems should be functioning more efficiently and respondents would not be burdened by an excessive amount of administrative duties. For more see a press release of the CZSO from 19 May 2015 European Parliament strengthened independence of official statistics (Czech only).
Contact:
Petra Báčová
Spokeswoman of the CZSO
Phone No.: (+420) 274 052 017
Mobile phone No.: (+420) 778 727 232
e-mail: petra.bacova@czso.cz
