Census boycott: Pro's and cons.

So... It's a case of: Complete the census and you're effectively allowing your data to be collected and processed by a subsidiary company of an American arms manufacturer with a history of lobbying, illegal data breaches and a history of spying on its citizens, and if you don't fill in the census, you're responsible for the lack of distributed funds to local resources and will no doubt be responsible for future cuts and losses to funding.

Many conflicting reports and campaigns.

Such as:

www.lawfulrebellion.org...

The first Census was taken in 1086 for tax purposes and displaced many Britons through the dividing of land – this was another step in destroying Cymric and Cornish culture, by not granting them the same Rights as Englanders. And only just in this 2011 Census, the ‘Welsh’ (Cymric) people have been given ‘status’.
The Census has repeatedly been used for propaganda, new tax policies and financial control, along with serving as a head count for various wars. For instance, the Napoleonic wars and the two world wars used valuable Census data to plan how to use human beings, as cannon fodder for their domination.
Rebellion to the Census began with opposition to the demographer, Thomas Malthus, who published his essay on the 'Principle of Population' in 1798. Malthus suggested that population growth would soon outstrip supplies of food and other resources, Britain would be hit by famine, disease and other disasters. Such lobbying pressures on Parliament caused the introduction of the Census Act in 1800 and the first official Census of England and Wales was on 10 March 1801. This strategy sounds eerily like the plan used to drum up support for the Western Forces to conquer countless defenceless cultures.

Which is against the census ^^.

But then again,

liberalconspiracy.org...

It’s perfectly reasonable for campaigners to use the fact that the Census is coming up to campaign on these issues.

But a boycott of the Census is the wrong way to go about this.

Everyone is required by law to fill in the Census, and can be fined if they don’t do so.

But much more importantly, the returns from the Census are a major part of how funding is distributed to fund local services. One London borough estimates that over the next ten years, they will lose £22,000 per person who does not complete the Census.

--

So which is it to be?

Do we willingly pass our information to Lockheed or do we refuse and face fines, jail and risk disrupting future spending budgets?

It's sad when "required by law" is all that is needed to justify action or inaction.

"Law" is inherently meaningless and each one of us subjected to it should feel grossly offended by it.

reply to post by mr-lizard


Im not going to start a big debate on this thread but im with the dont fill it in party ; )

My Idea for ATS polls would be effective in a thread like this.
www.abovetopsecret.com...

They can threaten me all they want with fines or jail, like somebody else mentioned i will pay the fine at like £5 a month and delay it as long as possible.

And what specific law actually states that i have to fill it in?

But that is My opinion as a person.

reply to post by mr-lizard


As in everything else, follow your conscience.

You can still fill it in, but add a bit of disinformation where appropriate, like thousands of us did last time by listing Jedi as religion. Just be creative, truthful or don't fill it in at all.

reply to post by SprocketUK


Yeah i did notice a lot of people are considering or are going to put Freeman in instead.

There is a link to the group on facebook if anybody still has a facebook : )


www.facebook.com...#!/group.php?gid=110273435691491.

I really don't care.

In fact, I'd be quite happy to post my entire census return on the internet for the whole world to see and use as they wish (except I expect it'd take too long to type up all the questions)

reply to post by johngtr

Hmmmm , what to do eh? I too am wondering whether to fill out/not fill out my form - or as you mentioned provide some mis-info. The facebook link you provided just takes me to my home page - could you provide the link again please? I would be interested to find out more.

Well, i didn't fill the form in last time (2001).
I am still waiting for the police to arrest me, a court appearence and the fine.
If a fair number of people refuse then there is little that can be done about it.
Just think how much it would cost and the courts would be tied up for months.
It would certainly be much easier just to ignore the ones who didn't fill the form in.

ETA I will not be filling it in this time either.

Originally posted by HEREFORD 1969
Well, i didn't fill the form in last time (2001).
I am still waiting for the police to arrest me, a court appearence and the fine.
If a fair number of people refuse then there is little that can be done about it.
Just think how much it would cost and the courts would be tied up for months.
It would certainly be much easier just to ignore the ones who didn't fill the form in.

Good point, there!

Cool name BTW. I grew up there, in Newton Farm.

reply to post by katseyes


yes sorry i will get the name of the group now .... and edit it in as my second line : )

type - Making the belief in FREE PARTIES a religion - in your search bar at your homepage , there is a group with well over 15,000 members

Originally posted by johngtr
reply to post by katseyes

 

yes sorry i will get the name of the group now .... and edit it in as my second line : )

type - Making the belief in FREE PARTIES a religion - in your search bar at your homepage , there is a group with well over 15,000 members

edit on 10-3-2011 by johngtr because: fb

Nice one! I'm gonna have a look at that in a bit! Thanks.

The easy, legal, way out is to go wild camping on Census night I don't think they send census forms to bothies either these days (though I know in 1981 the postmistress at Lochailort diligently walked 3 miles over the hill to Essan to deliver a form, and back next day to collect it (the mice however failed to fill it in and were subsequently fined 3 choccy biscuits!)

Being a keen geneologist who has traced his family tree back to 1680 I can tell you the importance of the census to family historians. However, the fact that the government, yet again, feel that they have to intimidate and bully us all into filling the forms in kind of makes me want to refuse to comply. Our governments have lost the ability to ask nicely and feel the need to bully and cajole and threaten us into doing as we are told. I'm going to risk not filling it in until the very last minute as I'm in no state to be fined £1,000 by sh*tty government.

reply to post by Essan


I suggested that an a different thread and i think it is a great idea, we really should have a freedom festival would be class : ). They cant collect information if we are in a field : )

A reply to an email I sent...

Hi

I think that there may be some confusion here with what is happening with
the census data. As I said before neither Lockheed Martin UK nor Lockheed
Martin in the US will have access to any personal census data. They are
managing a group of companies on behalf of the Office for National
Statistics. This group have provided specialist services for the census
like printing the millions of questionnaires and created websites for us.
One of these companies (UK Data Capture) will scan the paper questionnaires
when they are returned. But this is not Lockheed Martin or Lockheed Martin
UK. The contract is very strict that Lockhheed Martin UK will never be
involved in the handling of questionnaires or ever involved in processing
any of the data. Therefore as they will never be in possession of personal
census data they can neither use it for their own gain or lose it as you
suggest.

Completing a census questionnaire is law. The Census Act 1920 states that
it is an offence to refuse or neglect to do so or to provide false
information. The law on the 2011 Census is then further set out in the
Census (England and Wales) Order 2009 and the Census (England) Regulations
2010. Between them they state exactly who is responsible for doing what,
who has to fill in which type of questionnaire, who has to answer which
questions and how they should return their questionnaires. Not completing
the questionnaire is therefore a criminal matter rather than a civil one
and those people who don't complete it can be prosecuted. These types of
cases are held in a Magistrates Court and if found guilty people can be
fined up to £1000. This money goes to the court not to ONS.

The list of companies that you list are not shareholders, as ONS is a
public body as a non-ministerial government department. These companies
are the group of specialist companies that Lockheed Martin UK are managing
to help ONS with the census. As such no personal census data will be
shared with them.

Once you return your questionnaire it is scanned and the information is fed
into a large secure ONS database. ONS staff will then analyse this data to
produce statistics. The first step of this is to remove all names and
addresses so that the resulting statistics are completely anonymous. We
then use other statistical methods to ensure that it is impossible to ever
identify an individual from the statistics. It is these figures that are
then published.

A copy of your questionnaire is kept in a secure location and it is
government policy that this is kept locked away for 100 years.

I hope that this is helpful and reassures you as it is really important
that you complete your questionnaire. Every year £100 billion pounds of
public money is spent using census information. For example the Government
uses the census to see how many hospitals are needed in an area or how many
roads are needed or what kind of communities need funding. Therefore if
people don't participate in the census their communities might miss out.

Any thoughts?

My thought on the email is, why do you have to provide your name and adress when it is going to be stripped out anyway. They could always use a numbering system instead.

It still doesn't stop anybody from accessing the details before it goes into the database though, and that is the weak part of the system

ETA The last paragraph is misleading because births,deaths and immigration cannot in any way, be predicted for the next 10 years. At best they can only guess at the figures.

Just had a read through the questions. All pretty boring.

reply to post by Essan


My Mrs filled it in last night. Her only question? "Do you want to be a Jedi again, luv?"

reply to post by mr-lizard


I dont mind filling in a census form and I dont believe that LM will be using my data malevolently. However, I am not happy that the census is being carried out by an American arms manufacturer, a company that lobbies then profits for the killing of innocent people.

Is having a moral conscience worth a £1,000 fine? I know I couldn't afford to pay that atm.

It’s surprising how many ballot issues in the US are decided by just a few votes. I mean just one or two votes. We see it almost every cycle.
Normally we vote just once a year. But if they are really trying to ram something through, we can have up to four ballots per year.

So when you decide not to fill out your census forms you are short changing your immediate community. You could miss out on that new bridge because you no longer have enough citizens. Your police will get less funding. You can forget that new factory because there isn’t enough people in your area to staff it.

Go ahead and be obstinate some other community will get all the benefits.