British statistician 'saddened' by NSO head's resignation

A retired top British statistician is saddened by the resignation of Dr Gordon Cordina as director of the National Statistics Office.

Peter Bull, author of a European Central Bank publication, The development of statistics for economic and monetary union, was head of statistics at the Bank of England and led the statistics office of the European Monetary Institute and then the European Central Bank's statistics office until autumn 2002. He told The Sunday Times yesterday he had a very high opinion of Dr Cordina.

Mr Bull, who now does some consultancy work, including work for the Central Bank of Malta, said: "I am speaking only on my own behalf. But I am distressed to read about Dr Cordina's resignation. I met him a few times and I formed a very high opinion of him both professionally and as a person. He was very suitable chief statistician.

"He impressed me as an excellent person to lead the NSO at a busy and difficult time when revisions had to be made because of new methodologies to bring Malta's statistics fully in line with those of the EU and for Malta to prepare statistically to join the euro area. His resignation causes a serious loss," Mr Bull said.

Dr Cordina resigned following criticism from the Malta Labour Party and personal attacks in the General Workers Union newspaper L-Orizzont. The attacks followed an anonymous report issued by the MLP which raised a series of questions on statistical revisions made by the NSO, mainly concerning GDP figures. The major contention was over a downward revision of GDP figures up to 1995 and an upward revision for the last three years, leading to allegations of statistical rigging.

The Malta Statistical Authority replied to the MLP's report last Friday week and also announced Dr Cordina's resignation. The MLP has since reacted with more criticism, with party leader Alfred Sant claiming on Sunday that the report raised more issues about the revisions than were first raised by the party.

In his letter of resignation Dr Cordina said: "The events of these last weeks, which went beyond a mature, technical discussion, have shown me that I cannot keep fulfilling my duties with the peace of mind required by this position."

Mr Bull said the people he met from the NSO were "very professional and competent and are doing their best to adhere to European standards. I have no reason to disbelieve their statement that they were under no pressure to revise any statistics.

"Many statistics get revised, including many published by the European Central Bank and Eurostat.

"The European Central Bank encourages consistent revision practices. Users and compilers of statistics know there is a trade-off between accuracy and timeliness. Malta has been implementing a European standard known as ESA95 for national accounts and it was doing it in a staged way. This led to revisions of the statistics in question but there is nothing unusual in that.

"Revision does not imply manipulation. Revisions take place because of changes in methodology or new information," Mr Bull said.