Tim Holt (statistician)

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David (Tim) Holt CB (born 29 October 1943) is a British statistician who is Professor Emeritus of Social Statistics at the University of Southampton and president of the Royal Statistical Society (2005-). He was the last director of the Central Statistical Office of the United Kingdom and the first director of the Office for National Statistics (and ex-officio Registrar General).

[edit] Background

Tim Holt took a maths degree and a PhD in statistics at Exeter. Throughout his career, his main interests have been survey methods, sampling theory and official statistics. He took a particular interest, through his membership of the Royal Statistical Society, in the independence of national statistics from government. He was awarded the CB in 2000.

[edit] Career

His first job was with Statistics Canada, the national statistics office of Canada, where he spent four years before joining the Department of Social Statistics at the University of Southampton in 1980. He was Leverhulme Professor of Social Statistics from 1980 to 1995 and Deputy Vice-Chancellor from 1990-1995. From 1989 to 1991, he was also vice-president of the International Association of Survey Statisticians (IASS).

He became the Director of the Central Statistical Office and Head of the Government Statistical Service in 1995 and, subsequently, the first Director of the Office for National Statistics when it was formed on 1 April 1996 from the merger of the Central Statistical Office (CSO) and the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys (OPCS). He was President of the Labour Statistics Congress (ILO) in 1997 and vice-chair of the United Nations Statistical Commission from 1998 to 1999.

He returned to the Department of Social Statistics at Southampton in 2000, working part-time as Professor of Social Statistics. He carried out consultancy work for the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank and was elected president of the Royal Statistical Society in 2005. He was the 2003 recipient of the Waksberg Prize in survey methodology.

[edit] References

• "Professor Tim Holt", The Royal Statistical Society. Retrieved 15 June 2007.
• Tim Holt, Julian Champkin (2007). "Tim Holt", Significance, vol 4 issue 2, pp 75-76.

Preceded by Bill McLennan	Director of the Central Statistical Office 1995–1996	Succeeded by -
Preceded by -	Director of the Office for National Statistics 1996–2000	Succeeded by Len Cook
Preceded by Andy Grieve	President, Royal Statistical Society 2005–2007	Succeeded by David Hand