Harper’s self-destructive census bungle

Maybe Stephen Harper, in his heart, has mixed feelings about being in power.
Perhaps he fears it means he has sold out.
That’s one explanation for the Conservative government’s bizarre decision to turn the census into some sort of do-or-die issue.
The census hasn’t been top of mind for most Canadians. Or even bottom of mind, really.
But it’s a big deal for researchers and governments and businesses and policy advocates. Every five years, Canadians fill out census forms. The data is rolled up into a portrait of the country and how it’s changing.
Provincial governments and municipalities use it to assess programs and future needs; business groups monitor the state of the economy and the challenges ahead; school boards plan for future needs; researchers try to figure out what is changing - and why - in the lives of Canadians.
The Conservatives, for no compelling reason, want to make the data less reliable, the census less useful and comparisons with previous years difficult.
Most Canadians fill out a short census form every five years. Twenty per cent of us get the mandatory long census form, which asks more questions. That sample, randomly selected, provides Statistics Canada with reliable date.
The Conservatives, with no consultation or warning, are making the long form voluntary.
That’s a mistake, according to virtually every statistician, researcher and census user.
The decision means the census sample is no longer random. Single moms working two jobs might not fill out the forms; retired people might be happy to take the time. Natives living in remote reserves and hard-charging business executives might not get around to the census.
The portrait of a nation is skewed. Which means decisions made on the basis of the information is also unreliable.
So why would the Conservatives risk wrecking the census with a decision that is being denounced as wrongheaded by almost everyone involved?
Three answers make sense.
Harper could genuinely believe that the benefits of an accurate census aren’t enough to make it mandatory for Canadians to fill out the long form.
Or the Conservatives could be trying to please the portion of their base that sees government as the enemy and the requirement to fill out the census form as Big Brother run wild.
Or they figured the census wasn’t likely to attract attention and didn’t anticipate just how widespread and credible the opposition would be.
Whatever happened, it’s turned into a big problem.
I expect the Conservative strategists were right about the census as an issue.
But this isn’t about the census anymore.
The government stands accused - by everyone from the Conference Board of Canada to the province of Ontario to big unions - of making a bad decision.
The National Statistics Council - appointed by the government to advise Statistics Canada - wants the mandatory forum used in 2011 and proposes an overall review of the census before the next survey in five yhears. (The council includes former TD Bank vice-president Don Drummond, born and raised in Victoria. He found it shocking that the decision was made without consulting the council.)
And it has been dishonest. Cabinet ministers and the Prime Minister’s Office have claimed that Canadians were up in arms about the census. But Statistics Canada said it sent out 12 million forms in 2006 and had only 166 complaints about all aspects of the census.
They talked about the threat of jail and bureaucrats knocking on people’s doors in the night to demand answers.
But no one has ever been jailed for not completing the census form. And no one has faced a late-night call from the man.
Most seriously, Industry Minister Tony Clement said StatsCan supported the change. The agency’s head, Munir Sheikh, said that was not true and resigned as a matter of integrity. Who should you believe - the career government employee who resigned in protest, or the glib minister?
The changes to the census were a mistake. The Conservatives’ arrogance and dishonesty in refusing to acknowledge that are doing much more damage.
Footnote: An Ottawa Citizen editorial suggested another motive. “Ideologues don’t just ignore research,” the editorial argued. “They actually abhor it, because it gets in their way. If you approach the problem of drug addiction from an ideological point of view, then you have nothing but contempt for medical researchers who can show that safe injection sites reduce the harm of illegal drugs… This contempt for empirical research is not the Canadian way, but it has become the Conservative way.”