Canada Reinstates Mandatory Census, To Delight of Social Scientists (sciencemag.org)

Eloking writes with news that the government of Liberal Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will be reinstating the mandatory long-form census that the outgoing government had ended. Science reports: "The new Canadian government today announced it would restore the country's mandatory long-form census. 'Our plan for open and fair government starts today with restoring the long-form census,' said Navdeep Bains, minister of innovation, science and economic development, speaking in Ottawa alongside Jean-Yves Duclos, minister of families, children and social development. 'We're focused on good evidence-based policies.' Bains said that Statistics Canada would be able to meet the 2 May deadline to roll out the 2016 census, which is conducted every 5 years, and that there would be no additional costs to making it mandatory. He confirmed that residents who fail to fill out the census could face criminal prosecution, an issue that contributed to the decision by the Harper government to make the 2011 census voluntary."

Comments

Re:The farther left you go, the more you lose

[ameline]

Oh, yes - making policy and decisions based on evidence as opposed to ideology - wild indeed. I'm buckled in tightly with a 5 point harness; I'm ready for this ride.

Re:Open and

[gstoddart]

No, their plan actually calls for making evidence based policy instead of simply deciding what they want the facts to be.

You know, collect information and use it to make decisions, instead of just making decisions based on ideology which has nothing to do with reality.

But, hey, go live in your mountain cabin and continue to believe this stupid crap.

Census value

[StrangeBrew]

Take your tinfoil hats off already. I work for a civic agency where my primary role is to provide the decision makers with the right data necessary to make informed decisions. We, along with many other branches that serve the community, were severely handcuffed when Harper removed the long form and made the short form voluntary. The data is often used to help identify where focus and resources are best placed so that the taxpayers we serve get the most bang for their buck. Believe it or not, many public servants do understand who pays the bills.

Re:Tradition

[dryeo]

The same Conservatives who passed Bill 51 to spy on all citizens and directly gather the information? Yes they really must love their privacy to vote in the most anti-privacy government in Canadian history.