Hello, I'm standing at the Great West

Door of Westminster Abbey. As doors go,

it is pretty great and it's the starting

point today for a conversation which

forms part of the Abbey's autumn season

on the Long Story of Democracy put

together by Westminster Abbey Institute.

My name is Mark Easton. I've been working

with the Institute since it began in

2013. Now, the idea for these podcasts is

that someone in public life uses the

Abbey itself. The fabric of this

extraordinary structure to illustrate an

aspect of democracy. In this episode

we're going to be discussing faith in

democracy and to consider that idea I'm

delighted to say I'm joined by the

Director General of the Office for

Statistics Regulation, Ed Humpherson.

Thanks for coming along Ed. Hello and

it really is a great door. It is a great

door I'm quite right about that right

well before you take me to the places in

the Abbey you've selected for this

conversation I wanted to ask you about

the day job DG at OSR

I can see on your LinkedIn profile

that translates as standing up for

statistics in a world of abundant data,

what's the job, Ed? Well, the job

is statistics underpin our understanding

of public life. They form the bedrock

of political debate, of how communities

understand how they're getting on, how

individuals can find their place in the

world. The risk is that those statistics

are misused. They're misleading. They

don't form the kind of evidence based, they

want that, but they get polluted and it's

my job to ensure that that that form of

environmental pollution, if you will, is

does not happen. I have to stand up to

the appropriate uses for this regulator.

I'm a regulator. I'm a regulator and I'm

proud of it. OK, a noble calling. Let us

go inside. Let's go inside.

So, Mark, I brought you

here to the Chapter House.

Which it's got a few features that say

something to me about faith in democracy.

It's an amazing. But before I say

anything, I've thought about this a

little bit, but actually to come here and

be here with you, it is an amazing room.

It's it's got to weight and a presence

So tell me a little bit about it.

I mean, what I immediately see it's, it's

octagonal, it's obviously very old and

the sort of tiered steps, absolutely. All the

way around, absolutely. And and these are

the things which first strike me about it

in terms of democracy. So the first

English parliament met in this room

and in this room you have a couple

of things which I think are really

important about democracy. The first is

it's a place of complete transparency.

All can see all, everybody can see

everybody. It's also very clearly non

hierarchical. There is not a central spot

or politics in the round. It's politics

in the round. It's it's rather beautiful

in that that sense. It's also, as you

can hear, quite magnificent acoustically.

And so it's not just all. You can see

all. I think all can hear all.

And for me, that is a very important

feature of democracy, which relates to my

work, because my work is about ensuring

that everybody has access to the

information on which, you know, major,

major decisions are made. It's an act of

transparency. I think this space speaks

to that very powerfully. It's

interesting, there are these beautiful

paintings on some of the walls as well.

And I think some of those even perhaps

play to your argument about

accountability. Absolutely. So although

it's quite, it's a little faint on the

far side there, just over there, you can

see an image of the Judgement Day, the

day of judgement and Christ judging all.

And underneath that image was where the

Abbot of the of the chapter of the

Abbey would sit and reach a decision

after all the deliberation and all the

discussion, a decision must be reached,

but it's reached always with an eye of

what you, what you say here matters. What

you say, you know, the, the, the eyes of,

of God are on you. There's a divine

oversight and accountability in this

room. Really keep your humility as well.

Keep your keep your humility. And I think

that's, I think again that humility and

recognition of the importance of what you

do is, is fundamental to a healthy

democracy. You mentioned that this was.

Perhaps the scene of the first English

parliament. Now we're talking Henry the Third

here. Well, your history may be better

than mine there, Mark. I'll. I'll take

your word for it. Henry the Third. I

think Henry the Third held his great

counsel here. And almost certainly,

I'm told, took an oath to observe Magna

Carta in this room. So if we're talking

about the long story of democracy, this

has its place in that. Absolutely,

absolutely. And and that's again, rather

profound and beautiful. I think that it

was in this space that that that

commitment from the Sovereign to recognise

in a sense the rights of the

people was in here. I think it's

really, really, really rather remarkable.

So really another thing, sorry, I'm on

a roll here. The other thing which

I think is really wonderful and I

didn't realise until a couple of days

ago, is that between the Reformation

And 1863, this room, the room we're

standing in was the repository of state

records, including things like the

Doomsday Book. So this room I think

embodies another feature of democracy and

my work, which is it requires the

careful curation of respected evidence,

of facts of an evidence based on

which you can you can you can

form judgments. So it's not just the

openness and transparency, it's also.

This, this role of evidence as an anchor

point in our understanding of the world,

This room embodies that as well. It's so

interesting that you find this relevancy

in a room which is, you know, 1000 years

old. And you mentioned the

acoustics. You know, there is, despite

the high ceiling, there is actually an

intimacy, it feels to me, in this room,

which contrasts with the vastness of the

Abbey which we've just been through. And

as a regulator, if you a regulator of

our debate in this country, how do you

deal with the responsibility that comes

from having access to such an exclusive

position, a metaphor, this room being a

metaphor for that, if you like. Well,

just to build on the metaphor, I hadn't

really thought about it until you said

it, but our voices carry weight in this

room, but it's not us speaking loudly.

It's the room that is giving us the

weight and the authority, and this is a bit

of a cheesy metaphor, but that's how I

think about my role that you will have

seen the things that I do when when we

have to step into public debate, when a

particular politician has maybe misstated

statistics, we don't, we don't shout in

an aggressive or or attention seeking

way. We're in a sober and a calm way.

Rather as I'm speaking to you. We try and

we try and establish the appropriate

interpretation. We do so without an eye

to, you know, the big headlines we do

so with an eye to speaking calmly and

appropriately to help people understand

things and I think I hadn't thought about

it until you said it but I think speaking

quietly in a room where your voice is

amplified absolutely works with that

positioning. You mentioned the word

humility just now and your answer just

then suggests that's part of the way you

try to present yourself. Yes, yes I mean

at the end of the day I am in

my role let's give an example a

particular politician says they they.

Think that the employment figures show a

particular thing and my job is to

sometimes make a judgement as to whether

that's sound or not, or crime statistics

show that crime is out of control.

Ultimately, I'm just giving an

interpretation. I, I have no greater

monopoly on the truth than anybody else.

I'm giving an interpretation, but the

interpretation comes from a position of

not having a particular angle or a

particular perspective. It comes from

understanding the underlying evidence and

wanting other people to understand that

too. So I don't use the word humility to

describe myself, but I do come at it with

that sense of don't, don't get, don't get

bigger than your boots, you know?

When we talk about faith in democracy,

that's our sort of theme in this

podcast, I guess we're talking about

people having confidence that the power

the state possesses is used fairly

and the democratic debate is conducted

honestly. Do you see yourself having

to win people's trust in that

sense? Yes, I do.

And I thought about, I've changed

my thinking about this over the

years because I think. I

used to believe that what you needed to

do to gain people's trust and confidence

was be really knowledgeable, to have

knowledge, have the authority of

expertise. And you kind of do

need that. I mean, you can't obviously

not know what you're talking about. It's

important, but it's definitely not

enough. I think what you need

to do to supplement or sprinkle over that

is, is a willingness to be open, to

engage and just to make that really

literal. Anybody can approach me and say

they've seen something and have raised a

concern with it. If you go to our

website, we have a tab called Raise a

Concern and we treat an approach from you

as a highly respected journalist and a

member of the public and a politician. We

treat them all the same. We try and have

that openness to as I say, to supplement

what I hope is a degree of expertise, but

I don't think expertise is enough.

Interesting. I mean, our politics in

recent years has been fractious to say

the least. We know that civil servants,

public servants of all kind have had to

face quite a lot of hostility. Is that

something you have experienced and how do

you remain resilient to those challenges?

I mean, we encounter it less than

you might think. And that's

partly because we cultivate and

nurture this, this very sober and

I hope not very vituperative, not

very aggressive style, but it does

happen. And when it happens, I

suppose the main way of preserving

resilience is to separate the thing

and the person.

Somebody is on the attack that

happens. I try to not think about them. I

try to think about the issue that they've

put between us. Imagine in this room.

They've thrown an idea there into the

middle and we're both looking at the

idea. They're not attacking me, they're

putting the proposition forward. It's all

depersonalised, I find. The

best route to say to not let these things

eat away at you, to get to get beneath

your armour. I can tell you, think about

these things a lot. Why

did you decide to go into public life?

Was there a sense of duty?

I think you only see these patterns

in life. In retrospect, didn't

Kierkegaard say something along those

lines? You perceive your life backwards.

Perceiving my life backwards now, I think

I've always been drawn to roles which

have a sense of being slightly outside.

Systems of authority and power and

prodding them and poking outside.

Outside? Yes, outside. So we can go to a

room which is, which is absolutely about

being, you know, absolutely in the place

that's true. Somehow feel yourself as an

outsider. Absolutely. I'd probably be, if

I was in this room in 1263, I'd probably

be a clerk in the corner. Say, excuse me,

hood over your head. Excuse me, Abbott. I

don't, I don't think that's quite what

the Psalm says. I think that's what I'd

be doing. From school onwards

and at university and then then the

choices I've made in my career, it's

always been doing that. We've been

public life, but slightly, slightly, you

know, in a way I don't want to be in

the room where it happens. I want to be

slightly sort of outside the room where

it happens, if you know what I mean.

We've talked about truth and the

importance of trying to get close to it

in our in our public discourse. It's

said, of course, that we now live in a

post truth society where lies are just

part of the armoury of the powerful. How

much do you worry about that? I

worry about it at a reasonable amount.

I, I don't sort of go overboard

into despair because I think one thing

that the pandemic told us is that

when information is presented fairly and

openly and and comprehensively to the

public as it was about infections and

hospitalisations and so on, the public is

capable of forming their own judgements

in, in a relatively

Unmediated way they can reach their own

their own conclusions. So I think it is,

I don't think we should despair that

we're in a world where people could just

make up what they want and, and, and so

to speak, get away with it. I think we're

in a world where people try to do that.

But there's I sort of have a have an

enduring confidence in the underlying

common sense of British people. I think

that that I think gives me some optimism

here. Their ability to think critically,

think sceptically in a way, be cynical,

but cynical about about those in power. I

think that's, that's healthy. Faith in

democracy, does that word faith, which

also of course appears in the Institute's

mission of renewing faith in public life,

does does it have a spiritual or

religious dimension for you? Is that part

of what's going on here?

Actually, you don't have to. I'm

pausing because. A bit like

my answer, it's the only realised these

things in retrospect. I don't think I'm

here. In this room, nor doing the

things I do with the Institute. We both

are involved with the Institute because

of an overt sense of religious faith or

religious calling. But I think I'd

probably be deluding myself to say that

it's not there at all. I think it's, you

know, I had a upbringing in an Anglican

family, church going family, and I think

those things are sitting there.

Sort of working their way inside of me in

a quiet way. Certainly it seems to me

that there are ethics there are morals,

there are values and principles which do

guide you in your work? Absolutely.

Absolutely. Your job is in part, as

you've been saying, about upholding facts

and ultimately trying to ensure our

public discourse is based on truth rather

than lies. Are you always on the alert

for things that, in statistical terms at

least, don't quite add up? I am

Mark and sometimes even happens here in

the Abbey. Can I take you and show

you another part of the Abbey?

Interesting. Take me on.

So where are you taking me?

So, Mark, I brought you to what I believe

is called Poets' Corner is a part of of

the Abbey. I was here. Last January

at an event, hearing the Dean, David

Hoyle give a really nice talk. As I

was standing here looking at him, I

happened to look down and I looked down

at this, this plaque that we're just

standing over. A small white plaque floor.

And it says Thomas Parr of the County

of Sullop, born in 1483. Not, not very

remarkable. Lots of people born in 1483.

He lived in the reign of

10 princes. Let's check this out.

King Edward 4th, King Edward the 5th,

King Richard the Third, King Henry the

7th, King Henry the Eighth, King Edward

the 6th, Queen Mary, Queen Elizabeth,

King James and King Charles. And he died

aged 152 years, which is a ripe old

age. And I, I suspect that your antennae

were buzzing. Well, it would be, it would

be an outlier of quite remarkable,

remarkable proportions for, for somebody

to have lived that long, particularly in

this time. And so I saw this and

I'm afraid. And apologies to, to, to

David, to the Dean if he's listening to

this. I stopped listening to him and I, I

started to want to kind of do some fact

checking and get to the bottom of this.

I, I think it's a very unlikely claim.

Well, I, I think that we need people like

you in our public life just to constantly

be looking at the details of the plaques

on the, on the metaphorical floor of our

society and make sure everything is in

order. That's what I'm here for.

So finally, Ed, the inevitable

question given our topic today,

do you have faith in

democracy? I do. I do.

But I think it depends on the

the recognition by the participants in

democracy that what they are

fundamentally doing is doing what those

monks did in the Chapter House all those

years ago is that they are not there to

broadcast their views. They're there as

much to listen and to deliberate and to

have that transparency and that respect

for underlying evidence base. I think if

they do that, we can have faith in

democracy. Ed, thank you very much

indeed. Well, this is one of

three podcasts talking to people in

public service about democracy. If you've

enjoyed this episode, do check out the

others. For the moment from me, Mark

Easton and my guest Ed Humpherson from

Westminster Abbey, Poets' Corner, goodbye.