ONS chief under fire for wearing trans badge to staff briefing

[IwantToRetire]

Ms Rourke took over as acting national statistician earlier this year, after her predecessor retired through ill health.

Critics said her decision to wear the flag, which indicates a belief that there are more than two biological sexes and that transwomen are women, was an “ostentatiously political move”.

Civil servants are expected to be impartial under the civil service code and uphold the Nolan Principles of public life, while earlier this year the Supreme Court ruled that transwomen were not legally women.

Ms Rourke took over from Sir Ian Diamond who stepped down last month due to health issues.

Before that, she was deputy national statistician for health, population and methods, which meant she oversaw the ONS debacle on sex and gender identity.

At her first “ONS Live” event for all ONS staff, Rourke said she had an “uncomfortable message” for staff about Sir Robert Devereaux’s forthcoming review into ONS culture, expected to be released imminently.

She said: “It is likely to continue to be difficult for us as an organisation – we are experiencing ongoing challenges in being able to stabilise our suite of core statistics.”

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2025/06/18/ons-chief-under-fire-wearing-trans-badge/

Also in full at https://archive.is/wUqBQ

“we are experiencing ongoing challenges in being able to stabilise our suite of core statistics.”

What happened to the campaign for plain English?! I’d love to get sight of the detail behind that statement from her.

Is she acknowledging that the ONS have not been capturing accurate data for some time? Because they’ve encouraged (or certainly not discouraged) captured Govt depts, and organisations like the police, from recording gender instead of sex?

Is it an overdue acceptance that crime stats have been a load of nonsense for a while? And that the last census can’t be relied upon because households with poor English skills misinterpreted the gender categories?

“we are experiencing ongoing challenges in being able to stabilise our suite of core statistics.”

What happened to the campaign for plain English?! I’d love to get sight of the detail behind that statement from her.

I took her to be saying we didn't get away with slipping in the thin edge of the wedge GI question so need to think of a better way to make it "valid".

And failing to use plain English in the last census may not have just been an error but any attempt to create a result that justified asking the question on identity in the first place.

What happened to the campaign for plain English?! I’d love to get sight of the detail behind that statement from her.

Yeah, it just sounds like a load of waffle doesn't it.

She said: “It is likely to continue to be difficult for us as an organisation – we are experiencing ongoing challenges in being able to stabilise our suite of core statistics.”

How nicely 3rd person. Nothing directly to do with her then.
Did these difficulties fall out of a midnight sky or did she find them at the side of the road? (A Country Song)

I think despite knowing it would be partisan, I’d be delighted if she wore a suffragette colours badge so I sympathise to a degree.

However, given the role of the ONS is to collect data, it doesn’t bode well that it’s being led by someone with a poor grasp of the importance (or reality) of sex.

"You will not wear badges or display slogans or anything which shows you are a member of a particular political party. You may wear small badges showing your membership of a civil service trade union."

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/dress-code-conduct-policy/dress-code#:~:text=You%20will%20not%20wear%20badges,have%20a%20standard%20dress%20code.

I guess her defence will be, it's the holy month of Pride, so she's showing support for colleagues after the Supreme Court ruling. However, it's hard not to read it a provocative "fuck you" to her critics.

What about the extremely poor quality of their statistics and failure to be clear, the largest trans population being in Tower Hamlets etc?

There are serious problems at the ONS, not just related to sex and gender, but much more wide ranging. In particular, the failure of the Labour Force Survey, and repeated economic mistakes in the price indices.

https://www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/comment/office-national-statistics-fix-data-problems

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/jun/26/review-calls-for-10m-overhaul-of-the-office-for-national-statistics

“There has been a commendable interest in both new approaches to statistics (including the use of administrative data) and ensuring the relevance of ONS activity to wider political debate,” he said. “Unfortunately, this has had the (unintended) effect of de-prioritising the less exciting, but nonetheless crucial, task of delivering core economic statistics of sufficient quality to guide decision making.”

I believe that’s civil servant speak for “do your fucking job!!!”

I believe that’s civil servant speak for “do your fucking job!!!”