Keep the FOIA burning Four months after asking the Cabinet Office for a list of Cabinet committees and their membership, I finally received an answer. For those of you following the saga, you will be shocked — SHOCKED — to learn that answer was no. My Twitter thread details the whole thing, including the…

Learning to count They say the first rule of politics is learning to count. This usually refers to whether you have enough votes to get something through, and is more difficult than it might appear — the only vote you can ever be absolutely certain of is your own. But it’s also surprisingly…

Open chart surgery I’ve written a few times about people not using 100% bar charts when they should really think about using 100% bar charts. This week, let’s take a look at the opposite — when using a normal bar chart may have been the better choice. I happened to spot this example…

Speech therapy As expected, the Queen’s Speech heralded a new Data Reform Bill. We’re still waiting for most of the detail, though it sticks closely to the contents of the Data: A New Direction consultation. It seems the response to that consultation will be published shortly, followed by bill text before the…

Short and sweet This week’s list of links is again a bit shorter (/more manageable) than usual thanks to the bank holiday in the UK — said bank holiday also making this week feel much busier as I had various events to chair. So I’ll keep the intro short as well: Catch up…

Relight my FOIA The Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee (PACAC) has this morning published its report into the Cabinet Office’s Freedom of Information Clearing House. (I gave evidence back in the autumn.) ‘Damning’ would be a fair description. It’s concerned at the lack of transparency around the Clearing House and its record…

Easter parade The Easter break means fewer links, so this week’s Warning: Graphic Content is shorter than usual (some might even say of an actually readable length). So let’s get straight to it — after a few bits and pieces: Data Bites will be a cyber/defence special on Wednesday 4 May —…

Happy Easter! Yes, that headline does show I’m struggling to come up with a pun on ‘literacy’ for my new report with the ODI, ‘Data literacy and the UK government’, thank you for asking. There’s a summary here — and references to Blackadder and Frasier here — but I hope you’ll find…

Bits and Bites BREAKING: You may remember my rant about the government not releasing basic information about Cabinet Committees in response to a Freedom of Information request a couple of weeks ago. …