IDS accused of quoting 'dodgy' statistics in parliament |

Thursday 18th November 2010 | 17:31

IDS accused of quoting 'dodgy' statistics in parliament

Iain Duncan Smith suffered embarrassment today after he was accused of quoting "dodgy" statistics from a property website.

Speaking during an opposition debate on Housing Benefit reform on November 9, the work and pensions secretary said official figures from the Office for National Statistics showed private landlords had increased the cost of benefit.

But Ian Fletcher, director of policy at the British Property Federation, revealed that the figures were actually taken from the internet.

Mr Fletcher said: "DWP press officers and Ministers should not cut fast and loose with dodgy stats. I think the public will draw their own conclusions when the Secretary of State has access to the best statisticians in the land via the Office for National Statistics, and best rental data via the Valuation Office, and yet would prefer to use findaproperty.com.

“In an age of austerity it makes you wonder why taxpayers are paying for all these Government statisticians if the department would rather look up any old statistic off the web than use the professionals they have at their disposal.”

In a bid to justify the government's sweeping changes to housing benefit reform, Mr Duncan Smith told the Commons that private rents fell whilst housing benefit rose:

“We now know that, according to the Office for National Statistics, the private marketplace in housing fell by around 5 per cent last year. At the same time, Local Housing Allowance rates had risen by 3 per cent. There is thus a 7 per cent gap with what is going on in the marketplace.”

A spokesperson from the DWP, when asked if Mr Duncan Smith would make an apology to the House said: “A correction has been made. That’s all I can say”.

The spokesperson added: "This is a distraction from the important point the Secretary of State was making that whilst rents in the private sector went down between November 2008 and February 2010, private sector rents for housing benefit claimants went up.

“It is neither right nor fair that the Government is paying inflated prices through the benefits system. We have not sought to hide the source of this data which is cited in the analytical supplement of evidence given to the Work and Pensions Select Committee, now available on the Department's website.”

Links to the analytical supplement.

Links to the admin data.

DWP research on Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit

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IDS accused of quoting 'dodgy' statistics in parliament

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