So in order to "better help the federal government fulfil its duties under the Official Languages Act" the formerly mandatory soon to become voluntary language questions will become mandatory again.
Doesn't that suggest the other, soon to be voluntary, questions would "better help the federal government fulfil its" other duties?
I just don't get it. Why doesn't Ottawa want to rethink the census issue? It seems perverse.
From the Globe on-line:
Stung by francophone anger, the Harper government is adding questions on which languages Canadians speak to the obligatory short-form 2011 census.
It's a bid to quell the linguistic minority's fears that scrapping a longer mandatory survey will make it harder to measure their presence in Canada.
These questions were part of the 40-page long-form census the Conservatives are making voluntary over the objections of a broad range of economists, statisticians, provincial governments and researchers who warn it will undermine the reliability of Statistics Canada's data.
The decision came the same day a francophone appeal of the government's decision to abandon the obligatory long-form census scored a modest victory. A Federal Court judge agreed to expedite the French-Canadian group's application for an injunction against Ottawa's census changes.
...
The decision to shift language questions to the compulsory short form census helps the Tories avoid a potentially nasty political battle with a vocal minority – one that carried the risk of electoral backlash in Quebec and other provinces with sizable francophone minorities.
Mr. Clement said the changes will better help the federal government fulfill its duties under the Official Languages Act to provide French services for francophone Canadians.
4 comments:
It's not fair.
I DEMAND to be punished and pay a big fine for not wanting to disclose whether or not any in my family have a mental illness or problems bending over.
It is against my rights as a Canadian to not demand that every other Canadian tell the government such things so they can sell the data to social activists and special interest groups.
How DARE Stephen Harper refuse to punish us for wanting some privacy from Big Brother.
It's just not fair, I tell ya.
Mr. Morton, will you and the Liberal party please look into how many of the other 34 pieces of fed. legislation that are indexed to the Census to ensure the proper allocation of billions in program dollars & compliance with targets depend on long form data and may need that information every 5 (rather than 10) years? And mount some more injunctions if nec.? They're listed on p. 10 of the final 11 pp. Background/Analysis doc. Kady O'Malley posted at:
www.cbc.ca/politics/insidepolitics/2010/08/census-document-dump-things-fall-apart-the-centre-cannot-hold.html
..and it goes like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XtuPvwBa2U
The language questions were shifted to the short form on advise of the federal language commisioner. Thus they should have always been there. This really has nothing to do with the long form and all to do with the official languages act.
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