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Following is a statement made by the Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury, Professor K C Chan, in response to the report released by the Investigation Task Force on Statistical Data Quality Assurance today (March 25):
"The Investigation Task Force on Statistical Data Quality Assurance has completed its examination of the authenticity of data concerned and the existing statistical data quality assurance mechanism. The Task Force submitted its investigation report to me today.
"I would like to express my gratitude to the three non-official, professional members of the Task Force: the Choh-Ming Li Chair Professor of Statistics of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Professor Chan Ngai-hang; former chairman of Oxfam Hong Kong Mr Tse Kam-keung; and the Director and General Manager of Hang Seng Indexes Company Limited, Mr Vincent Kwan. They have, under a very tight time frame, provided independent and impartial guidance on the investigation, drew conclusions after analysing the investigation findings and evidence impartially, and offered valuable recommendations on three main areas of the investigation.
"The Task Force concludes there is not sufficient evidence to query the overall authenticity of the data collected in the relevant surveys and considers the quality of the data collected is sufficiently sound to provide basic inputs for the compilation of the relevant statistical figures, though there is room for improvement in the data quality assurance system and process. The Government will carefully consider the conclusions and the recommendations made by the Investigation Task Force, and ensure that the Census and Statistics Department will implement the Task Force's recommendations expeditiously, and at the same time continue to enforce the recently announced improvement measures."
Ends/Monday, March 25, 2013
Issued at HKT 17:30
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