CSO defends labour force data

The minister made the allegation during debate on the national budget that the four officers had been falsifying data regarding the sample of the population and therefore labour force data at the CSO was incorrect over a period of time.

In a release last Friday O’Brien responded to the issue and defended the data. “Firstly I wish to unreservedly assure all stakeholders that official statistics disseminated by the CSO are collected and processed in accordance with strict international statistical standards which include rigorous and robust quality assurance procedures. In light of the CSO’s adherence to the UNFPOS in concert with constant peer review from our international development partners, users of official statistics are guaranteed a high level of accuracy,” he said.

He reported that the CSO management has determined that the four officers were “derelict in their duties”.

He explained that the four officers are temporary assistant field interviewers and are accused of not visiting enumeration districts and households at the time periods prescribed by the sampling design of the Continuous Sample Survey of Population (CSSP).

He said it is alleged that the officers rather used information from past records to complete questionnaires and listing records instead of conducting contemporaneous interviews.

O’Brien pointed out that National Statistical Offices (NSOs) and other research organisations all over the world “encounter problems where field officers do not actually visit the target households of the respective surveys, but fill out questionnaires based on old data (previous interviews)”. “This is why practitioners of national statistical reporting globally, employ comprehensive quality assurance procedures to discover and correct errant data. At the CSO, when completed questionnaires are returned to the office by field officers, these documents are carefully checked by trained statistical editors so as to identify errors of consistency.

Responses from households that are not pre-coded are then coded using international or national classifications by specially, highly trained staff,” he explained.

He further explained the process and reported that during the course of routine operations the suspicious work of the four temporary assistant field officers was discovered.

He said that senior field staff were then dispatched to the relevant enumeration districts and the households where the updated labour data were collected.

O’Brien also reported that the offending officers were reported to the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Planning and Development and officials in the ministry are now investigating the matter for necessary action.

“The accuracy of the published data was therefore in no way affected, however sadly the timeliness of the release of such data was negatively impacted. It must be emphasised that four junior officers such as temporary assistant field interviewers cannot influence data on a national scale,” he stressed.

O’Brien pointed out that from an international perspective, data are now being captured on the field via tablets equipped with GPS and audio visual recording to verify that field officers conduct interviews where and when they are supposed to. He noted that the CSO field staff are now being trained to use such devices which have already been purchased.

“When these tablets come into use, the progress of each field officer will be monitored by the respective supervisors remotely,” he added.

He said that moving forward the management and staff of the CSO “have long recognised the need for substantial improvements in the efficacy of national statistical reporting in Trinidad and Tobago”.

“The CSO has acknowledged that a number of its data sets are not provided in a timely fashion and institutional restructuring is needed.

Further, the National Statistical System is in need of greater coordination and strengthening,” he added.

O’Brien pointed out that the Cabinet appointed Task Force for the Implementation of the National Statistical Institute (NSI) is tasked with the organisational transformation of the CSO into an independent, transparent and well governed institute.

“The Management of the CSO has been actively supporting the efforts of the Task Force and looks forward to the new and improved NSI and NSS in 2017,” he added.