Theories of the Information Society, Third Edition - Cryptome

INFORMATION AND DEMOCRACY
to intervene in ways which threaten the integrity of statistical data. Taken
together, these developments amount to a ‘politicisation of knowledge’ (Phillips,
1989), long considered above the fray, something which inevitably casts doubt
on the reliability and rectitude of information once trusted by all shades of
political (and other) opinion.
The first shift may be traced to the aftermath of Sir Derek Rayner’s (1981)
report to the prime minister on government statistical services in 1980. Rayner
advocated cutting the costs of government information (by reducing services and
staffing costs up to 25 per cent) and shifting the onus away from public service
towards charging commercial rates for information to those who required it.
Characteristic recommendations from Rayner were that ‘[s]ubsidy of statistical
publications should be quickly curtailed’, that information for businesses
should ‘be charged for commercially’, and that, while ‘more flexible means of
enabling the public . . . to have access to figures held in government should be
exploited. . . . The costs of providing such facilities should be covered by
appropriate charges to the individuals or bodies concerned’ (Privy Council
Office, 1981, Annex 2). Consonant with this was the decision taken to make
HMSO a ‘trading fund’ rather than a service of Parliament, thereby to encourage
a more market-orientated mission (Levitas, 1996).
Consequences of this treatment of information by market discipline were cuts
in government funding and large increases in the cost of materials going to the
public. As Bernard Benjamin (1988) succinctly said, ‘[t]he general accusation is
. . . that the Government wants to publish as little as possible as expensively as
possible’ (p. 2). Perhaps the best-known casualty of government cuts was the
ending, after twenty-six years, of the annual General Household Survey in 1997,
though it supplied materials about much social life in the UK, interviewing 10,000
households about issues ranging from contraception to childcare. Where publication
continues, increases in cost of government materials have far outstripped
inflation and there has been a generalised move towards ministerial departments
charging for information previously distributed gratis. This can only mean
difficulties of access to information for many citizens.
However, it should be emphasised that tendencies towards marketisation of
statistics are not uniform and can vary depending on political decisions. Provided
one has a PC and Internet access, electronic access to government statistics is
readily available, the address www.statistics.gov.uk being a wonderfully convenient
entry point to official information. Recent administrations have done much
to encourage electronic availability of statistics, as such making freely accessible
a huge amount of data. Thus Social Trends 35 (March 2005) comes free on the
Internet, though it costs £41 for a hard copy. In the same way back copies of this
digest of enormously illuminating statistics are free to download. Social Trends
makes readily available essential information on matters ranging from our ageing
population, to home visits of general practitioners, to rates of cohabitation, to
destinations of holidaymakers. It is an invaluable aid to democratic debate. Hardcopy
prices of such publications are prohibitive for most citizens, but its availability
online – a direct outcome of politicians across the party divide committing
themselves to this policy of ‘e-government’ from as early as 1992 – makes it easily
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