Makes Census:
According to the bright lights at right wing charity, The Fraser Institute, the Prime Minister’s long census degrading from compulsory to voluntary is exactly what is needed. But not for the obvious reasons of privacy and that government shouldn’t know how many bedroom’s are in your house.
No, the reason is that business that want these statistics should pay for them. Now on the surface that is appealing. Why shouldn’t business pay for them? Well let’s think about that! Firstly, if corporations provide statistics as opposed to polls or surveys that they are doing all the time in any event, that information will be specific to that corporation’s need. Secondly, that information becomes proprietary information. No one can see it except at a price. And thirdly, because no one can see it except for a price, the assertions of that information are and will be difficult to challenge. Therefore as an example, the Fraser Institute’s assertion in 2006 that 400 million dollars can be saved in the Health Care Industry by paying kitchen and cleaning staffs close to minimum wages will be difficult to challenge. Why? The Labour statistics portion of the census will be inaccurate. It then becomes my stats. vs. your stats. Which of course serves the purpose of the corporate agenda which fully funds the Fraser Institute. There will be no arbitrator like Stats.Can. That can be trusted that is.
No Census:
That Canadians should have access to where, how and what kind of country they are living in and who is in control of what. That Mel Hurtig or Stephen Clarkson or Maud Barlow or Naomi Klein or Linda McQuaig or Donald Gutstein or the Parliamentary Opposition or non-profits or university researchers et.al. should have access to information that isn’t provided by the corporation’s in charge.
