Construction output figures in the dock: the case for the defence
In my chats with national statisticians about the troublesome output statistics, I sense it was the word “baloney” used by Kier chief Paul Sheffield that irritated more than most other comments on the figures. The word troubled me, probably for different reasons. I take cursing seriously and the use of out-of-vogue slang emanating from the Italian-Irish-American inter-war gangster era for some reason just jarred. Still, the Office for National Statistics decided to hit back at the growing criticism of –…