Census spies will track every home: Anger at 'intrusion of vast computer network'

 

 

By Steve Doughty

Last updated at 7:57 AM on 22nd February 2011

 

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Every home will be monitored by state ‘tracking computers’ to check if people return their census forms, it has been revealed.

The surveillance network will try to ensure more than 22million households fill in the 32-page forms when the national headcount is carried out in five weeks’ time.

But the checks – part of a £500million attempt to assess the population – provoked protests about intrusion yesterday.

 

Mandatory: Census director Glen Watson said at the launch of the advertising campaign for the 2011 Census that 'the vast majority of people fill it in sensibly'

 

Addresses have been collected from state and commercial sources and recorded on a database, which will be handed over to the Royal Mail and Ordnance Survey for continual updating after the census.

The tracking network – based at a high-tech factory in Manchester – will register immediately when someone returns a completed census form online, as around six million people are expected to do.

It is designed to show up which of the 33million printed census forms have been properly returned within two days of a family or an individual posting one. Failing to fill in the form is a crime which can bring a £1,000 fine.

Advice booklets printed in 56 languages for immigrants

 

On form: Filling in the census

 

Advice booklets have been printed in 56 languages to try to persuade immigrants and visitors who do not speak English to fill in census forms.

Available from telephone helplines, over the internet or at community centres, they include versions in Twi-Fante from Ghana, Amharic from Ethiopia, Tagalog from the Phillipines, Nepalese and Vietnamese.

The scale of the effort to reach non-English speakers is likely to prove another controversy, as local authorities will be expected to use the information both from the distribution and from the census itself to provide services to people who have not learned English.

Providing translations to large numbers of people is expensive. It is also considered by most analysts to encourage people to remain in isolated communities.

Promotion of the census costing nearly £7million will include television advertising in nine languages and dialects – Cantonese and Mandarin from China, and Gujarati, Punjabi, Urdu, Tamil, Bengali, Sylheti and Hindu from the Indian subcontinent.

Print advertising will also cover Greek, Turkish and Somali.

 

 

It is hoped the system will avoid the failure of the last census – carried out in 2001 – which missed a million people.

Returning a form effectively became voluntary, and only 38 people were convicted of refusing to comply with the census.

Most of those not counted lived in inner cities, especially in London, and areas with high immigrant populations.

 

Glenn Watson, census director for the Office for National Statistics, said yesterday: ‘We are producing a questionnaire tracking system which means we will know on a day-to-day basis who has not returned their questionnaire.

‘We are producing a new address register to underpin this and we are providing an online completion option.

‘There has been a three-and-a-half million growth in population since the last census.

‘Two thirds of this growth has come from migration or from increasing fertility rates because of immigration.’

However, Daniel Hamilton of privacy pressure group Big Brother Watch said: ‘It appears a mass database of census refuseniks will be created.

 

‘Those who are slow to return their forms – or downright refuse to hand over their personal details to a central government database – will be bullied and threatened until they are cowed into submission.’

 

Tour; The 2011 Census Bus in London, which will tour the country ahead of this years Census

 

The census forms will, officials say, take an average family 40 minutes to complete. But there is a strong possibility that the complexity and breadth of the forms and the questions it poses may demand more time and effort.

Even one-person households will have to contend with 57 questions and 393 tick boxes.

A couple with four children face 272 questions and 918 tick boxes, with more to cope with if they have visitors on the census night of March 27.

People can expect to be asked how many bedrooms, bathrooms, cupboards and conservatories they have, and what central heating they use.

A question on religious belief is voluntary, but detailed information on ethnicity, colour and language spoken is not.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1359205/1-000-fine-fail-32-page-census-form.html#ixzz1EgVhgbNn

I'm still Jedi.

I'm still Jedi.

 

Is that the plural of Jedward?:rolleyes:

I'm still Jedi.

 

I'm going to put Sith, more exclusive:P, and lets face it..... better.

I'm going to put Sith, more exclusive:P, and lets face it..... better.

 

Or as you're American, you could simply plead the Sith?:rolleyes:

I'm still Jedi.

 

not if I fill in the form you're not :p

 

 

our descendants want nice information when doing their tree research, not garbage

You've just insulted 390,127 people who stated their religion as Jedi on their 2001 Census forms in England and Wales. Shame on you my young padawan learner :angry:

You've just insulted 390,127 people who stated their religion as Jedi on their 2001 Census forms in England and Wales. Shame on you my young padawan learner :angry:

 

(Just mind trick her):P

 

Did anyone put Sith in 2001?:laugh3:.

You've just insulted 390,127 people who stated their religion as Jedi on their 2001 Census forms in England and Wales. Shame on you my young padawan learner :angry:

 

I've not insulted anyone :p merely stated that if i fill our form in you won't be classed as a jedi because you're not one.

Looking forward to filling mine in, especially Q17

Looking forward to filling mine in, especially Q17

oops there it is

 

 

hmmm, what to choose, what to choose

What is this?

i've not looked at the form yet. please tell me that's not a real question.

oops there it is

 

 

hmmm, what to choose, what to choose

:bomb: Got the worst earworm imaginable now because of this.

*clicky*

thought so - question 17 doesn't exist :p

 

"this question is intentionally left blank, please go to question 18"

oops there it is

 

 

hmmm, what to choose, what to choose

 

 

:laugh3::laugh3:

Is multiple answers allowed?

 

It's easier to fill in the questionnaire online as it jumps passed the questions you don't need to answer ;)