Indexing
Sir: In case Nicholas Davenport seriously believes (16 September) that the Central Statistical Office has rebased the index of industrial production from 1970 = 100 to 1975 = 100 with some idea of cooking the books, I must remind him that this rebasing follows a well-established statistical practice. Economic indicators need to be rebased from time to time to reflect real changes in the economy. The original index based on 1948 = 100 has been successively rebased on 1954, 1958, 1963, 1970 and now 1975. Nowadays most countries are adopting the yearsending with Os and 5s for rebasing their major economic indicators. The CSO has already started preliminary work for the next rebasing on 1980 = 100.
A. J. Boreham Director, Central Statistical Office, Cabinet Office, London SW1
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