‘Share government data to boost economy’, says UK statistics watchdog chief

The UK Statistics Authority's chair says linking data sets from departments could aid growth and improve services

We need to make data sharing across government the rule

Ministers could find ways to boost the economy and improve public services by combining data from separate government departments, according to the head of the UK's statistics watchdog.

Sir Robert Chote, the chair of the UK Statistics Authority, said that too often government data was siloed" because departments and other bodies were worried that people may uncover weaknesses in the data or even reach inconvenient conclusions.