If there’s one organization you’d expect to be involved in recruitment, it’s the body responsible for collecting labor market data for the whole of the UK.
However, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) is facing staff attrition as it tries to overhaul its statistical work. And the old debate about remote and hybrid work is just around the corner again.
What’s happened?
Some 958 staff have left the ONS in the last year, according to figures obtained through a freedom of information request. Financial Timeswhich is about 20% of the workforce.
This figure is up sharply from pre-COVID levels in 2018-19, when 694 people left the company.
At the same time, the statistics body, which provides key data on economic growth and the labor market, notes that recruitment levels have halved over the past five years.
ONS chief economist Grant Fitzner blamed the outflow on a hot job market with strong demand for skills and a natural rise in redundancies after more people stayed in their jobs during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Budgeting issues related to inflation and wage pressures have impacted hiring, Fitzner added.
“We have to set priorities and sometimes that requires difficult choices, but I don’t think that’s any more true for the ONS than for other parts of government,” Fitzner told reporters. FT.
“One of the consequences of the budget problems we faced last year was a reduction in staffing levels.”
The battle for remote work
The ONS recently announced plans to bring statisticians back to the office on a hybrid basis, joining a long and growing list of companies demonstrating flexibility in the COVID era.
However, unusually, the statistics body faced stiff resistance, leading to a strike by around 1,000 staff.
In April employees voted for the strike if they were forced to obey orders to spend two days a week in the office.
The Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union, the group representing ONS workers, later told the ONS that its 1,000 members would refuse to obey with orders to be physically present 40% of the time.
It is unclear how much the dispute has affected broader recruitment.
According to data from FT, the difference between laid-off and new employees has become particularly stark in the past few months as the threat of strikes has increased. The number of people joining the ONS in the first quarter of the year fell by more than 60% compared to the same period in 2023.
A More Serious Challenge
The exodus of staff, whether in the office or not, could not have come at a worse time for the ONS.
The statistics body is trying to overhaul its crucial Labor Force Survey (LFS) after discovering its old method led to inaccuracies in measuring unemployment.
The overhaul came partly because Gen Z and millennials were becoming increasingly difficult to reach by phone, skewing ONS labor force data.
Policymakers use ONS statistics to make important decisions, including the Bank of England’s decisions on interest rates.
The ONS believes it has a way of reaching younger survey respondents. The body has increased its use of monetary incentives to get Gen Z and millennials talking while increasing the frequency with which they reach out to them.
Earlier this year, the ONS said publication of the new and improved LFS had been delayed until September.