OTTAWA – Canada’s former chief statistician says a new federal bill to give Statistics Canada more independence falls short because it doesn’t protect the census from political interference.
Wayne Smith says the government of the day would still have control over census content, leaving it vulnerable to the sorts of changes the Conservatives imposed in 2011 by turning the long-form census into a voluntary survey.
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The Liberal bill tabled Wednesday aims to change the Statistics Act to require that the government make public any cabinet orders that strike at the agency’s work to collect, analyze and disseminate data.
Smith says that provision would help protect the agency from some political interference by forcing governments to confront public opinion about their decisions.
The Conservative decision to cancel the long-form mandatory census was done quietly, but stirred outrage when it became public.
The Liberal government brought back the mandatory survey as one of its first acts in power; the response rate to the census this year was about 98 per cent, one of the highest in history.