Stats NZ Job Losses A Not-So-Standard Deviation

Minister of Statistics Andrew Bayly has assured the public that the government will still have access to accurate data, despite Statistics NZ cutting its workforce by 153 jobs - or as he described it ‘one in fifteen, is that right? Or one in twelve? Something like that’.

Minister Bayly fronted up to the press gallery carrying a ball-point pen and envelope, saying he was leading by example as he explained that much of the ‘basic number-crunching’ that Statistics NZ currently did could be outsourced across the public sector.

‘Now let’s do some rough calculations – can someone turn round so I can write on their back? Thanks.’

‘Okay so realistically every government agency across the public service will have at least one nerdy type who did NCEA Level 3 Applied Maths and knows how to work a scientific calculator. If we can shift some of Stats NZ’s workload to these brainboxes while increasing their productivity by say eight per cent year-on-year, that will be a saving across the board of, hang on, carry the one… seven trillion dollars’.