The Finance Department in the local authority has estimated that at least 45 people per day on average need to use the local library to justify the cost of keeping it open – costs relate to staff wages, heating, lighting, cost of periodicals and so on. You have been asked to evaluate the data collected on the mean number of people using the library in the context of this minimum figure.

Draft a report to the committee (most of whom have low levels of numeracy)

evaluating the information available. If you had been given the task of collecting data on the number of users how would you have done this and how would you try to ensure you had a representative sample?