Indeed in this country, there are two groups of people. In fact, some would call these groups the haves and the have-nots. This is an not inaccurate way of describing it, but those that would might have the two switched. Canadians form two groups: those that receive from the government and those that pay to the government. Those who form — or are constituent to — organizations dependent on government policy (and spending) are firmly against the changes to the census. Those on the other side are largely ambivalent because they are the large, unorganized and unsubsidized net taxpaying masses.
The conservative/libertarian Fraser Institute think tank’s motto is “if it matters, measure it.” The untruth of the inverse of this statement is at the centre of why this government should follow through. “If you measure it, it matters” is the motto of those net tax-receiving organizations who only matter if they can make their case. Prime Minister Stephen Harper has tried the ideological argument against these groups for years. But ideology is by its nature debatable; removing the framework of debate is his shortcut to victory.
There is one positive aspect to this controversy – millions of Canadians are now fully informed that, contrary to threats by census takers, refusing to fill out the long form census carries no actual penalty.
I suspect many of us will find that information useful.
h/t Maz2
Reported yesterday that no one has been sent to jail for not filling out the long form, maybe so, but the THREAT was there. How many people filled in the form because of the threat?
Go Libs go and take the NDP with you!!!!!!!!!!!
Capt Bob,
There’s something perverse about a society that wants to decriminalize hard drugs and maintain criminalization of the census. I think it speaks volumes to how much people want to behave and be treated like children.
Again, to force a population to reveal private facts about themselves – or face imprisonment – is not the mark of a democracy.
Further, to even think, for one minute, that the data on that form is accurate -is the height of stupidity.
To rely on only one data source for your statistics is unscientific.
Therefore, I can only conclude, since the scientific reasons for the mandatory long form don’t exist – that there must be other reasons for the Liberal insistence on such a form.
Is it their usual need to have Big Govt control others?
Is it their support for all those govt jobs that are required in that mandatory census?
It can’t be for the data. As I’ve said, there is no reason to conclude that the data has any ratio of accuracy.
So I admit, I don’t understand why they insist on it.
Yet, mostly the young reveal everything about themselves on Facebook every day.
Censuses always and always and always have been about taxes and political power, in one form or another.
I believe the expression is “From whom much is given, much is expected.”
So I see the question got asked of the StatsCan boyz. What is the problem of voluntary…they go on about bias (which may be true). But when asked about jail, they demure and say nobody has ever been sent for refusing….so tell me again what makes the current census mandatory other than a label.
Kind of like sugar ceral that claims it has vitamins and minerals, when in fact they come from the milk and not the cereal.
The long form census issue is, to statists, symbolic of their long and hard fought efforts in growing leviathan to its current apogee where one class works for a living while the other votes and where entitlements and rent seeking are so pervasive as to completely blur the distinctions. As trivial as it is, Harper’s efforts at removing it are, in their minds, a harbinger of things to come and therefore it must be opposed. If he was successful on that file, God knows what might come next, a temporary freeze on the CBC budget perhaps? “Governing” with 32% of the nation’s support pretty much precludes any significant and positive moves at shrinking leviathan. More proroguing please.
Recently we were told to participate in a Stats Canada labour survey, which ended in going on for months, them calling us every few weeks asking all sorts of questions.
At the beginning we thought we were being good diligent citizens by participating, but by the end of it my wife and I were truly sick and tired of Stats Canada. It changed my perception of them entirely.
The head of Stats Canada resigning demonstrates a certain level of childishness.
So all told I’m very pleased the long form is being axed. The tentacles of governments are simply getting too long and reach too far into our lives. Amazingly, despite the enormous size of government, they cannot even get the simple things right, like how to properly educate children.
last census in, what, 2006? I found out I’m in district 666. no duff. so I scrawled a very rude note on the empty form advising the powers-that-be there is no way I’m gonna fill out a gubbamint form with 666 on it.
nothing happened.
ET: ” … to force a population to reveal private facts about themselves – or face imprisonment – is not the mark of a democracy.”
You’ve definitely got that right, ET. And that was exactly Canada’s problem under the multi-culti, equality (sic), tax and grab, Librano$. Democracy was seeping away like rainwater in the ground and most of the population didn’t notice it, largely because the LPC’s buddies in the media were behind them and weren’t doing their jobs.
Investigative reporting? What was THAT during the Librano hegemony? Investigative reporting went AWOL, while Canadians’ actual “rights” and “freedoms” were being whittled away.
Thank G*d, we have a party in power and a leader who recognize how undemocratic and illiberal the Liberal$ and the Liberal-dominated bureaucracy’s power has become.
I suspect that Kate knows the actual quote from the Scripture (Luke 12:48), but has used a play on words to make a wicked point, the one that Stephen Taylor makes: “Canadians form two groups: those that receive from the government and those [who] pay to the government. Those who form — or are constituent to — organizations dependent on government policy (and spending) are firmly against the changes to the census. Those on the other side are largely ambivalent because they are the large, unorganized and unsubsidized net taxpaying masses.”
Taylor further makes the point that “if Stephen Harper succeeds in moving [a change in the census], he will be in the initial stages of dealing a huge blow to the welfare state.”
No wonder the usual suspects are screaming bloody murder!
PET Cemetery survey says, experts affirm: Ici socialiste Utopia.
…-
“Montreal one of world’s happiest places”
(googoo)
Of all the moronic debates I’ve heard this long form/no long form takes the cake.
Presumably the administrative part of a government
knows better than other groups if and how census
data are used.
If a government finds that census data are not used,
or cannot be reliably collected,they are justified in not collecting those data.
It is perhaps worth noting that census is a form of control.
According to one British authority on control of insurrection
and guerilla warfare, the first step is a census, a basic census,
so that it can be established whether a village is likely to be harbouring enemy.
As for the smug Dipper pressing Clement to “just answer the simple question”, I would have replied, “None. In fact, you can do anything in Canada without fear of doing much, if any, time or recieving much of a punishment. Cut off someone’s head on a bus. Kill a poor immigrant in the airport. Smash up Toronto and burn cars. Just don’t rough up or God forbid kill any Taliban in Afstan. That will bring you misery you can’t imagine.”
One of the five duties of StatsCan under the Statistics Act is “(d) to promote the avoidance of duplication in the information collected by departments of government.”
Also, contained in the Statistics Act is this little dandy.
“Returns under Income Tax Act
24. For the purposes of this Act and subject to section 17,
(a) the Chief Statistician or any person authorized by the Chief Statistician to do so may inspect and have access to any returns, certificates, statements, documents or other records obtained on behalf of the Minister of National Revenue for the purposes of the Income Tax Act or Part IX of the Excise Tax Act, and
(b) the Minister of National Revenue shall cause the returns, certificates, statements, documents, or other records to be made available to the Chief Statistician or person authorized by the Chief Statistician to inspect the records.”
In other words, StatsCan has access to your income tax returns – I wonder how many people know that.
Given that, why does StatsCan demand essentially the same information on the long census form in apparent contradiction of their legal duty to avoid the “duplication in the information collected by departments of government.”?
Lots of misinformation out there. Heard part of Bill Good’s show the other day. Norman Spector was on there, as well as the requisite lefty, discussing this census kerfuffle. Spector pointed out to Bill that during the CKNW news a few minutes ago, the news reader said the Tories want to “scrap” the long-form census, when in fact that is not the case.
Doesn’t surprise me about CKNW though…
“He wanted to know if I could pass on a few names of possible interviews for right-wingers that support the government’s stand to scrap the long-form census”
Correct me if I am wrong, but when did the government ever say they were going to SCRAP the long form? I keep hearing and reading this, seeing comments on CTV et al using this as the basis of arguments. They are removing the threat of jail/fine and revamping how it is to be delivered.
Personally, I would be all for the scrapping of it, most of anything that may be considered vital statistics are available through other levels/programs/departments of government(s). Oh, and unless I feel like having some fun (Jedi, 22 bedrooms, 4 husbands, etc) if I do receive a long form, it will find it’s way to file 13. My life is nobody’s business.
Exactly Anne. Anybody who is riled up about this has been fed the wrong information….
The Tories need to do some informing of their own. The media either is dumb and lazy or wilfully misinforming the public.
“The media either is dumb and lazy or wilfully misinforming the public.”
How about a whole lot of both. As we have seen in the last few years the Canadian News Media have been in bed with the Liberals since Uncle Louie was in power. Now with the internet we can see the rampant abuse of power that has been foisted upon Canadians. Its time that we cleaned house, scrap the party funding, scrap the vote to serving felons and their government cheques, scrap the long gun registry, scrap the mandatory long form census, scrap multiculturalism, scrap bilingualism, scrap the department of Indian Affairs, scrap most of overseas aid, etc., etc., etc!!! Time we doffed the harness that the Liberals have enslaved us with. Its time to look after the real tax-paying Canadians. Sorry about the rant but I’m p*ssed at the extend that the opposition has manacled the Harper government, and how they are more concerned about Taliban detainees than they are about Canadians.
I learned in 1981 that you didn’t go to jail for not filling out the form.
It warned me. Even gave the government ferret a chance to arrest me. He threatened jail to which I responded “hurry it up, I could use a good meal.”
30 years now and nary a peep.
The socialist lamprey exists to suck the life out of useful parts of society.
$80 Billion a year for HRDC ??
That sound you hear is a giant flush of hard earned taxpayer’s wealth being wasted on the leeches.
“I believe the expression is “From whom much is given, much is expected.”
You’re new here, eh?
I’m not taking stats Canada’s word for it that no one has been imprisoned, they file the criminal complaint but I doubt very much if they keep tabs on the stats on whom they persecute? Kinda odd that a professional world renowed, gag me with a spoon, doesn’t keep stats on people they persecute for not filling out the mandatory census. The CHRC asserted the self same thing and didn’t they get a fella incarcerated twice for violating their cease and desist hurt feelings order?
The pro-census crowd crow “Pure science” give me a break this is just he snivel service protecting it’s power. I can’t wait until the CPP and UI are given police powers like Stats Canada, Revenue Canada and the CHRC. They’ll be hauling ole people off to jail for not getting the cheapest meds available. I wish I were joking.
Joey at July 28, 2010 12:11 PM
[…..(b) the Minister of National Revenue shall cause the returns, certificates, statements, documents, or other records to be made available to the Chief Statistician or person authorized by the Chief Statistician to inspect the records.”
In other words, StatsCan has access to your income tax returns – I wonder how many people know that…..]
I didn’t know that and I am not amused.
I guess it’s like all Gummint databases—-like the “secure” Firearms Registry which has evolved into an information resource to criminals.
Fred at July 28, 2010 1:47 PM
[……..The socialist lamprey exists to suck the life out of useful parts of society.
$80 Billion a year for HRDC ??……]
$80 billion? That is……worse than requiring the lifeguard tower wheel chair accessable.
How much of the snivel service exists like the Firearms Registry/HRDC to provide employment to the PARTY faithful?
ET writes, “I can only conclude, since the scientific reasons for mandatory long form don’t exist – that there must be other reasons for the Liberal insistence on such a form. . . .
“So I admit, I don’t understand why they insist on it.”
I think I do. ’Just because the Conservatives have a different opinion and to cause a ruckus. The Liberals always need to be the centre of attention. They manufacture trouble where there isn’t any. Why don’t they practise what they preach and save all the energy they waste blathering on about complete rubbish just to make the Conservatives look bad? What spoiled brats the Liberals are.
And what idiots too many Canadians are to fall for their idiocy.
So, if no one has gone to jail in 40 years for refusing to complete the long form wouldn’t that make all previous censuses effectively voluntary. The only thing that has changed here is now we all know it’s voluntary.
As well, no one seems too upset that federal government bureaucrats are deciding, on their own, which laws will be enforced and which ones will be ignored.
Apparently Stats Canada makes money selling info garnered from the long forms to groups that are interested in the numbers. Couldn’t they take some of the money they are going to use for advertising (a reported 30 million), and money that they are going to save on enforcement (people were paid to harass everyone who got a long form to ensure that they filled them out)and pay the citizens to fill out the long forms. Voluntary works alot better when someone puts coin in your pocket. An incentive to fill out the form works a hell of alot better than a threat and this would also probably stop the lefties from moaning that people won’t fill out the forms without incarceration. Heck you might even get people lining up to fill them out as long as it doesn’t interfere with their EI, welfare or other subsidies.
“I believe the expression is “From whom much is given, much is expected.”
You’re new here, eh?
Posted by: Kate at July 28, 2010 1:49 PM
I wish that were so, Kate. Actually, I’m just a little slow.
Tony Clement appears before the Standing Committee on Science, and Technology:
http://www.cpac.ca/forms/index.asp?dsp=template&act=view3&pagetype=vod&lang=e&clipID=4288
It’s always good to hear stuff directly from the source.
BTW census data is no longer really confidential.
Researchers in the social sciences can get access to it, at special terminals set up for the purpose.
Of course they are sworn to confidentiality.
In Newfoundland that oath is just so much hot air –
everybody knows/is related to everybody else,
and wants to know everything about their friends/enemies/relatives.
The overheating K car was undoubtedly caused by a blown head gasket. It happened a lot in the Chryslers of that era. My son bought a used one and I advised him to check the head gasket. He owned it for 2 months before it began overheating from a blown head gasket.
Further to my comment at 3:06 PM, the rudeness of the Libs and Dippers in asking their questions is appalling. Not only rudeness but nasty insinuation. One of the Dippers asks a question and then continues to pepper the Minister with accusations even as he’s answering the question. The Chair finally told him to shut up and let the Minister answer the question. I hope a lot of people will see this and send them a message via the ballot box.
Could someone answer one simple question for me?
According to StatsCan’s website and press release, “Information previously collected by the mandatory long-form census questionnaire will be collected as part of the new voluntary National Household Survey”.
Does this mean that the new NHS is shorter than the old form, or that the NHS is the same form, but just voluntary? No one seems to be able to answer that for me.
Thanks.
This whole “controversy” should vividly remind us how few ACTUAL problems our country faces these days!
kevinb – to my understanding, the new long census form is the same as the old. The only difference is that it’s voluntary.
“Mr. Clement and the PMO argue that their new voluntary survey – the National Household Survey, which is now available online – will ask questions “identical to the questions that would be asked in the mandatory long-term census.” Globe and Mail: Taber’s Ottawa Notebook.
I remain stunned. I don’t understand why the switch from ‘mandatory-or-jail’ to ‘voluntary’ has set off a hysteria equivalent only to Bill Clinton and Monica. After all, don’t these Liberals and NDP realize that a govt that insists that a census is ‘mandatory-or-jail’ is no longer a democracy but a totalitarian govt with overtones of Stalinism?
Furthermore – what’s the problem with these people? Don’t they know that a self-reported census has a strong tendency to ‘falsification of data’? The data is not valid! A machine is usually reliable in its measurements; a human being is not…for various reasons including ignorance and deliberate falsficiation.
I’ve yet to answer a survey with validity – either because the questions didn’t permit a valid response or because I was not interested in providing one.
So- I don’t get the reason for the hysteria.
ET – If this were an Ontario gov’t thing, I would say they are diverting our attention from the raiding of 3 ministry offices in what may be cases of racketeering/extorsion.
Such great uses of our tax dollars. I feel good, don’t you? Just makes me want to work more so I can give them more.
As you, I don’t understand why the census changes are such a big deal. You would think those in a tizzy want people to actually GO TO JAIL for not completing a FORM for crying out loud. Meanwhile a woman murders her daughter and does NOT spend a minute in jail. Is there ANY common sense left anymore?
FYI: there are in fact penalties for not completing the long form but the StasCan people are not being up front about it.
For example, nobody has gone to jail but people have in fact been fined and we don’t know many or for how much. I bet if you refuse to pay the fine then you will go to jail!
I have also read elsewhere that between 40 to 60 people have been “prosecuted”, although they don’t explain what that actually means if it doesn’t mean jail.
The Conservatives aren’t making the short form voluntary…potential jail awaits those that don’t fill it out.
Rove @ 5:20 : “The Conservatives aren’t making the short form voluntary…potential jail awaits those that don’t fill it out.”
So why change that? That sort of personal info is minimalist and you can practically find it in a public phone book. I suppose that means we shouldn’t be submitting basic info on our income tax forms too, drivers licence, etc., eh Rove? What terrible dictators those Conservatives are…
ET the Snivel Services and it’s policies are the last Liberal Strong hold, if Harper is successful in creating new policies the Libs view this as the greatest threat to their restoration of power because a Liberal Snivel Services ensures their liberal agenda goes unimpeded. The Snivel Service is stacked with libs, in fact people outside the Ottawa/Hull zip code weren’t allowed to apply for snivel service jobs under Liberal rule and I do believe Harper hasn’t changed the policy either? Get it the Snivel Service is staffed with hard core loyal liberals, if in doubt follow CBC’s articles on the RCMP brass leaking their whining sniveling smears to the media.
The MSM supported the smears from snivel servants via RD, the attacks from Stats Canada that Harper is destroying pure science, and now it’s the RCMP brass leaking inflamatory smears. This isn’t randomn people the snivel service seems to be declairing war on Harper and his right to dictate policy.
Terrible dicatators? No, just hypocrits.
ET, further to my answer at 11:54 a.m. and lookout’s at 2:39 p.m. and now rose’s at 5:34 p.m., it’s pretty clear that the hysteria is being manufactured by the Liberal$ for reasons of their own: ‘probably to continue their attack on the CPC and, definitely, to keep their hold on things in the civil (sic) service.
As Stephen Taylor points out on his blog, ” … if Stephen Harper succeeds in moving [a change in the census], he will be in the initial stages of dealing a huge blow to the welfare state.”
‘Absolute anathema to the Liberal$.
Rove: “Terrible dicatators? No, just hypocrits.”
Ok then Rove, let’s call your bluff — no more hypocricy. Let’s eliminate all forms of identification and invasion of privacy including income tax. You obviously haven’t thought it through because that would mean no more taxes and no more big Government — everything would be privatized! It would be a Mike Harris paradise.
Well you can say good-bye to the Dippers and the Libs forever if we call your bluff…
How about ~
From Whom Much Is Taken, JUST SHUT UP THE **** UP!
There is no doubt census data has been used to divide and re-distribute. You could see it. Watch it being implemented in stages.
Whether for better or worse Germaine Greer’s quote along the lines of ‘Whoever controls the statistics, controls the government.’ As Women’s Lib did ok for itself with a lot of made up data the people that made that leap retained the control of the statistics.
What other statistician do you know of that has the power of internment to produce good data?
No ricardo, you don’t get it. The hypocrisy is that the short form is still mandatory. If they really care about personal privacy, let’s see them make the short form voluntary as well.
Or is this just a manufactured crisis? If so, they just shot themselves in the foot over something that didn’t bother most people.
So the only folks that are complaining seem to be the vested interests. Article the other day pointed out a number of private companies that rely on Stats Can census data. Well tough cookies go out and hire someone to get the info you need. Like maybe one of those survey parasites that tell us 9 time out of 10 accurate to within +/- 2.5% blah blah blah. Oh and only survey 1000 or fewer to tell us something completely erroneous. And disturb my dinner to boot.
The short form lets the government know I exist. That info a government should have. What they don’t need to know is anything else.
The thing I deeply resent is the government sniffing around my personal heritage, the race, religious, ethnic origins questioning. It’s disgusting, specially for some one who considers themselves Canadian with no hyphen implied.
The fact these social engineers are forcing me into one of their identity group statistical ghettos, really burns my ass.
I will return any such government inquiry marked with a fresh set of obscene doodles, like the last one I sent in.
rove – the short form asks only 8 questions
“The short-form census, which will remain mandatory, asks only name, sex, age, marital status, common-law status, first language learned and whether or not you wish to release your information after 92 years for historical purposes.”
All of this can be found in your health card, your driver’s licence, your tax data. It’s hardly intrusive. And mandatory? There are no penalties.
But the long form – well, some of those questions are, to say the least, strange.
How about:
Does this person have any
difficulty hearing, seeing,
communicating, walking,
climbing stairs, bending,
learning or doing any similar activities?
You can answer: Yes, often; Yes, sometimes. No.
Hmm. First – those attributes are hard to quantify. What does ‘difficulty communicating’ or ‘bending’ mean? And what does ‘sometimes’ mean…on a scale of 1 to 5?
And how does this question assist a researcher? Of what?
I can understand the language questions and even the ‘ethnic’ ones. But the questionnaire mixed up ethnic with religious/cultural. It put in ‘Jewish’ with a list of ‘English, Scottish, Ukrainian…but left out other religions.
Education questions are valid.
Household activities are just plain ridiculous and frankly unanswerable with any degree of validity.
“How many hours doing unpaid housework, yard
work or home maintenance for
members of this household, or
others?
Some examples include: preparing
meals, washing the car, doing laundry,
cutting the grass, shopping, household
planning, etc.”
“looking after one or more of
this person’s own children, or
the children of others,
without pay?
Some examples include: bathing or
playing with young children, driving
children to sports activities or helping
them with homework, talking with
teens about their problems, etc.”
These questions have no business being on a statistical census about the population. They are qualitative and subjective and can’t be transformed with any validity into hard data.
I also think that the ‘who did you work for’ question has no business on a population survey.
Income? That’s intrusive. The data can be extrapolated, without names, from Income Tax data. This census links the name to the money.
The question about housing – when was it built (who knows?) and number of specific rooms..doesn’t make sense. That kind of data can be found, more accurately, in the building data from permits in municipalities. Furthermore, defining a room with one single purpose is risky.
And asking if the building is in need of repairs – well, what’s the point of that?
Hydro costs? Again, what’s the point. More accurate data can be had from the hydro offices – without linking the data to the individual name.
I don’t see that these questions on the long form provide a researcher with valid or reliable data. It’s very risky to accept self-answered surveys as valid.