Thursday 24 February 2011

Cense or Censibility




Woodsy42 (who is a new blogger) has been kind enough to write this guest post from an English perspective. I intend to follow shortly with a post about the Scottish one, but I think many of his points are relevant to those north of the border.


Cense or Censibility
a guest post

The new 2011 UK census is fast approaching and while we have mostly all done them before and it’s no big deal this one is already creating some controversy.

I suppose in its favour we must acknowledge that filling in a form at home or online is rather less onerous than travelling across the desert to your town of birth with your pregnant wife on an ass and her having to give birth in a stable because the inns are full. The census has plagued mankind for over 2000 years, although the Bible doesn’t tell us what the questions were back then.

Most people, I suspect, have little problem with a basic people count, providing information like names, ages, and addresses feels relatively innocuous for most of us. Our 2011 form however has some questions which to many people seem exceptionally intrusive, indeed some sections appear more like a phishing exercise than a people count.

The full list of questions (England) is here but I will pick out a few.

They want to know about visitors staying overnight on March 27th. Every house gets a form and usual occupants are entered, so why do the government need to know exactly who wasn’t home on that one night and who they were spending the night with? Is this meant as a benefit cheat trap? 

Do they really need to know how many rooms you have and how many are bedrooms? Maybe they think they will find gangmasters with houses full of illegal immigrants who are too stupid to lie? But it’s an odd question.  My second bedroom is an office now the kids have left home, rooms are not inscribed with their use.

Then they want a complete cross-listing of every relationship between every person in the house, yet very strangely further down ask again for the marital/partnership status, why ask twice?

They ask what type of central heating you have, even the number of cars. Have they forgotten DVLA or is this a phishing expedition for unregistered vehicles?  They want to know whether you regularly stay away from home and if so where, or if you have a second home. 
Then there is a whole bunch of questions about your education and work, but it descends into asking if you were working last week or actively seeking work or waiting to start a job. This has nothing to do with population counts and Jobcentre should have this information. Maybe they just want to compare notes?

One question only, religion, is marked as voluntary, leaving the assumption that all the others are legally required, but whether they actually are is something I can’t easily find out.

You must decide for yourself whether you are prepared to truthfully provide all this information. I won’t advise anyone to break the law, but in your decision process take note that an American company have the contract to collate the data. While it’s true that the same company did the last census the American Patriot act has come into force since then allowing the US authorities to sequester US company data. 

This means that you won’t just be telling the UK authorities that you have a holiday caravan in Rhyl and spent the night of March 27th there with the neighbour’s wife, you will also be telling the US authorities,  and if Wikileaks gets in on the act  Uncle Tom Cobley and all.



13 comments:

Joe Public said...

"They want to know about visitors staying overnight on March 27th. "

Who, I wonder, will write 'Osama bin Laden'?

And more importantly, how long will it take to get a reaction.

George Speller said...

If you smoke why not declare it as a religion in the next census.
Just put "SMOKER"
Half a million Jedis did it. We can do the same.

subrosa said...

I'm going to take some advice from Captain Ranty Joe.

subrosa said...

And for job I intend to say smokologist George, unless I can find a better term beforehand.

Jo G said...

The fact that the SNP government gave the contract to collate the information to an American company is the biggest objection I have in this exercise. Where will they collate it? On a US database or a UK one? If it is the former I object to my information being held on a computer in a foreign country.

I think submission of the form is compulsory Subrosa but I'm not sure they will send it back if some sections are not completed.

banned said...

Will there be space for me to boast about my bizarre sexual predilictions?

subrosa said...

Jo, I'm doing a wee bit research on this at the moment. If you want to know how far I've got drop me an email and I'll send you some links.

subrosa said...

I'm quite sure there will be. Just be careful though banned, you could affect the Human Rights of the reader. :)

Brian said...

If Jedi or Smoker are allowed as religions, then I want to complete the form in Klingon or Latin.
Life was so much simpler when choices were English, CofE, RC or Excused.

WV allych - a Welsh word for clearing one's throat?

subrosa said...

I don't see any problem in you completing the document in any language you like Brian.

The WV is certainly not Scots. :)

Woodsy42 said...

I think the Welsh have their own variant of the form Brian, I think nationality and language choices are subtely different on each.

JohnRS said...

Once a Jedi, always a Jedi.

Some of the other sections look like they need non-standard responses as well.

Oh yes - pale green ink is good, they can't copy it easily.

subrosa said...

Mmm pale green ink? I'll have to see if my local stationery place has some.

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