Economists, public health professionals and leaders in business and the charitable sector joined together Tuesday, July 13, to urge the federal government to reverse a decision to end the long-form census.
The decision, delivered by federal Industry Minister Tony Clement, will mean the 2011 census will no longer include a mandatory "long form," which asks detailed questions about households and goes out to 20 per cent of the population.The removal of the long-form has been cited as a way to give Canadians a break from having to spend time revealing personal information such as ethnicity, income and disability.But at the news conference at the United Way of Greater Toronto Headquarters, a broad and hastily convened coalition said the government is making a mistake."The long form is a critical tool that helps business, communities and governments decide where you need your money," said Armine Yalnizyan, senior economist with the Canadian Centre for Policy Initiatives. "Without this information, we are all punching in the dark. Without this information, we cannot properly allocate our resources. The people who will pay most dearly are those who are already most vulnerable: the poor, aboriginal communities, recent immigrants and racial minorities."The long form will be replaced by a voluntary survey that Canadians can fill out if they choose. The problem with that, according to Toronto Dominion Senior Economist Don Drummond, is that a voluntary form won't give a real picture of Canada."This will over-represent certain groups," he said. "The middle class white population will be over-represented. The core visible minorities, aboriginals and the very wealthy, will be under-represented."Drummond said by removing the mandatory long form in 2011, soon previous census data will be rendered useless because statisticians use census information to determine changing trends and understand where problems might arise.Carol Timmings, Toronto Public Health's director of policy and planning, said that data is essential to planning public health policy - like last year's H1N1 or swine flu mass vaccination."If we had not had access to this information, we could not possibly have understood the priority populations that were most at risk from the pandemic," she said. "The opportunity we have to work in school communities, to understand the needs of children where we want to make our investment will not exist without this data."Jillian Mason of the United Way of Greater Toronto said the data helps the charity decide how to spend about $100 million in donations they receive each year."United Way has relied on detailed census data since the early 1980s," she said. "It's the only source of reliable data for low-income individuals in our city."