Comments on: A Sensible Census Solution http://www.thecorch.com/politics/a-sensible-census-solution The personal website of Keith Little. Wed, 08 Feb 2012 00:37:59 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: thecorch.com » The Census Ship is Sinking http://www.thecorch.com/politics/a-sensible-census-solution/comment-page-1#comment-1416 thecorch.com » The Census Ship is Sinking Thu, 22 Jul 2010 22:33:01 +0000 http://www.thecorch.com/?p=680#comment-1416 [...] to reliable, accurate data. Canadians would lose good data on their country’s population. My second concern was that the move to scrap the long-form census was a political decision, by a political party, and [...] [...] to reliable, accurate data. Canadians would lose good data on their country’s population. My second concern was that the move to scrap the long-form census was a political decision, by a political party, and [...]

]]> By: theluketaylor http://www.thecorch.com/politics/a-sensible-census-solution/comment-page-1#comment-1055 theluketaylor Wed, 21 Jul 2010 17:54:35 +0000 http://www.thecorch.com/?p=680#comment-1055 The thing I find so ridiculous about this entire debacle is a voluntary long form will cost more money to distribute and return worse results. The only two elements to a census are how much does it cost and how useful are the numbers it returns. The PM has decided to focus on privacy, ignoring the fact StasCan has ironclad rules regarding the use of the data. The more I hear about the lead up to this bizarre decision by the PMO the more it seems like petty revenge. Statistics collected and published by StatsCan are continually making legislation put forward by Conservatives seem backward and unnecessary. The best example is the extensive crime package the PM has being trying to pass that includes tougher sentencing guidelines and mandatory minimums. The whole bill hinged on the fact crime is rampant and getting more dangerous. That sounded like good logic until it was pointed out by StatsCan that crime rates for both violent and non-violent crime has dropped every year for the last 20 years. I think the PM has fallen into the trap of thinking that because all of his decisions are motivated by ideology that everyone must be governed by ideology as well. People who work at StatsCan don't have an agenda. They don't collect numbers to make people look bad or rally public support to their cause. They collect numbers because numbers tell stories and lead to better public policy. The thing I find so ridiculous about this entire debacle is a voluntary long form will cost more money to distribute and return worse results. The only two elements to a census are how much does it cost and how useful are the numbers it returns. The PM has decided to focus on privacy, ignoring the fact StasCan has ironclad rules regarding the use of the data.

The more I hear about the lead up to this bizarre decision by the PMO the more it seems like petty revenge. Statistics collected and published by StatsCan are continually making legislation put forward by Conservatives seem backward and unnecessary. The best example is the extensive crime package the PM has being trying to pass that includes tougher sentencing guidelines and mandatory minimums. The whole bill hinged on the fact crime is rampant and getting more dangerous. That sounded like good logic until it was pointed out by StatsCan that crime rates for both violent and non-violent crime has dropped every year for the last 20 years.

I think the PM has fallen into the trap of thinking that because all of his decisions are motivated by ideology that everyone must be governed by ideology as well. People who work at StatsCan don’t have an agenda. They don’t collect numbers to make people look bad or rally public support to their cause. They collect numbers because numbers tell stories and lead to better public policy.

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