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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."
I think he is referring to the legal requirement to tell the government everything they want to know. But maybe not. I don't really know what's on the Canadian long form. If it is like the US it is mostly bunch of stuff the government already has access to (like income), but are too lazy to go get, and a bunch of stupid stuff like how many bathrooms are in your house.