1971 CENSUS (Hansard, 19 April 1971)

§ The Lord President of the Council and Leader of the House of Commons (Mr. William Whitelaw)
As the House knows, the Order authorising arrangements for the Census, including details of all the topics to be covered, was approved by the House on 17th February, 1970. The detailed questions were before the House from May to November, 1970 and went unchallenged. There seem to be two main sources of anxiety —firstly, secrecy, and secondly, the position of the immigrant communities.
On secrecy, I should like to give the following clear and specific assurances. Both this and the last Government have given an absolute guarantee that information about individual people or families will in no circumstances be released to any authority or person outside the Census organisation itself. There is a further fear about secrecy through the use of the computer. In fact, no names or addresses are fed into the computer.
Fears have been expressed also about possible disclosures by enumerators. All enumerators are required to sign an undertaking to maintain the secrecy of the information they handle. Any failure in this respect makes them liable to fines or imprisonment up to two years. Furthermore, anyone who wishes to send his answers direct to the Census officer for the local area may give the information in this way and so by-pass the enumerator. I am sure that the House as a whole would wish to assure the enumerators that it has the same confidence in their integrity that has always been shown in past Censuses.
Secondly, as to the immigrant communities, in addition to the absolute guarantees given for the community as a whole, I welcome this opportunity to reinforce the words of the Chairman of the Community Relations Commission, Mr. Mark Bonham-Carter, when he said: It would be particularly sad if immigrants were to look on the census as a threat to their security. It is the very reverse. The truth set forth in facts and figures is our chief weapon and I urge them to use it.

§ Mr. Thorpe
I thank the Leader of the House for that statement. Since the Registrar General has made clear in the past week that he expects to sell to third parties £500,000 worth of the information which we provide, does not the right hon. 816 Gentleman agree that it is not unreasonable for the public to want the fullest knowledge about the form in which such information will be made available? Second, since some of the safeguards have already broken down, in so far as close neighbours—and in one case a local headmaster—have been appointed enumerators, since many of the enumerators—this has been my experience—do not know of the facility whereby people may post their forms direct to the Census officer, and further, since an undertaking was given by the previous Government, during a debate in which my colleague Mr. Eric Lubbock and, I think, the hon. Member for Colchester (Mr. Buck) both took part, that there would be pre-Census publicity, and there has been no pre-Census publicity by this Government, will the Leader of the House consider the suggestion that an independent watchdog be appointed, the British Computer Society, to report upon the confidentiality of the procedures and to vet the material which is made available to third parties?

§ Mr. Whitelaw
On the right hon. Gentleman's first point, I repeat the assurance that no information about identified persons or households will be released from the Census Office. On the question of pre-publicity for the Census, a leaflet was delivered to every household before Easter informing the public that a Census was being taken and repeating the assurances given in the debate last year that their answers would be treated as wholly confidential.
On the right hon. Gentleman's last point, I am glad to tell him that, in view of the special importance of the Census, the Census Office will gladly accept an offer made by the British Computer Society to discuss with it the arrangements for security, and the same will apply to any other responsible body.

§ Mr. Longden
Will not my right hon. Friend agree that the very last people who should be heard to complain about this Census are Members of the House of Commons who neither voted nor spoke against the questionnaire when it was introduced by the last Administration?

§ Mr. Whitelaw
That is the fact: the House had the opportunity, it considered the questions, and right hon. and hon. Members thought that the arrangements were perfectly adequate for the purpose.

§ Mr. Millan
As the Minister responsible for answering the Census debate in February 1970, may I ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he is aware that all the assurances which he has given today were given explicitly in that debate? In view of that and the marked lack of interest of hon. Members at that time, is it not thoroughly irresponsible and hypocritical now for any hon. Member to raise some of these issues in terms which will cause deep concern and anxiety to members of the public and, in particular, to immigrant members of the community?

§ Mr. Whitelaw
I accept at once that the assurances which I have given are exactly in line with the assurances given by the hon. Gentleman speaking from this Front Bench in the past. As for the actions of any hon. Member, I have always stuck to one simple formula, and I still do, that each right hon. and hon. Member is entirely responsible for the consequences of his own actions.

§ Mr. Buck
If the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Liberal Party is to escape a charge of political opportunism, ought not the House to have a further explanation from him as to why his official spokesman in February last year welcomed this Census and raised none of the matters which the right hon. Gentleman has been raising since that date?

§ Mr. Whitelaw
I do not think that those are matters for me.

§ Mr. Thorpe
Perhaps the Leader of the House will agree that it might be rewarding for the hon. Member for Colchester (Mr. Buck) if he were to read that debate again to see the very specific questions which Mr. Eric Lubbock put, and understand that it was only upon his receiving certain specific assurances from the previous Government that there was not a vote on that Prayer, though it is our contention that this Government have not stuck to those undertakings?

§ Mr. Whitelaw
I immediately refute the suggestion that this Government have not stuck to the undertakings of the last Government. We have done so absolutely. So much for the past; there it is. It is clear from the feeling I sense in the House today that what the 818 House wants to do now is to give the maximum reassurance to the public, and, in particular, to the immigrant communities, on the question of the Census form, and to hope that all, in their own interest, will fill up the forms.

§ Mr. Roy Jenkins
What the right hon. Gentleman has just said will, I believe, command widespread support in the House. Great though our respect and affection is for the right hon. Member for Devon, North (Mr. Thorpe), many of us do not entirely go with his Easter extravaganza. In particular, will the right hon. Gentleman agree that it is of great importance that the immigrant communities should realise that nothing is of more value to them than that the facts, not fantasies, should be known? Nevertheless, will the right hon. Gentleman look at the question—I am not necessarily taking a view on it—of whether the sale of information to private organisations for a limited amount of the cost of the Census is really worthwhile, and, in particular, will he give an assurance that there will be no question of the sale of small blocks of information—relating, say, to a particular village —which might well result in individual identification?

§ Mr. Whitelaw
I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for what he has said in support of my hope that in all our interests, and particularly in the case of immigrant communities, the Census forms will be properly filled in. On the right hon. Gentleman's last point, I think it right that I should repeat the absolute assurance which I gave before, that no information about identified persons or households will be released from the Census Office. I think that that covers that point.

§ Mr. Roy Jenkins
The question of small areas?

§ Mr. Whitelaw
Small areas, too.

§ Miss Quennell
Will my right hon. Friend bear in mind the great difficulty which local authorities have in identifying disabled people and recognise that an opportunity has not been taken in this Census for identifying the number of disabled persons in this country? Will he have a word with his right hon. Friend and suggest that subsequent Censuses 819 should use this form of inquiry to probe that difficult area in our society?

§ Mr. Whitelaw
I note what my hon. Friend says, which goes rather further than this year's Census.

Mr. Leslie Huekfield
Will not the right hon. Gentleman nevertheless accept that many organisations of rather dubious bona fides have expressed interest in Census information? Has he, for instance, taken into account the firm of Tracing Services Ltd., which has expressed a very direct interest in the Census and which has already been convicted on charges of public mischief? Will he get his right hon. Friend the Secretary of State to announce some restrictions on the sale of information on a small scale to such organisations? This is a very important point, and the House should have some reassurance on it.

§ Mr. Whitelaw
I think that I have already given that assurance in answer to the right hon. Member for Birmingham, Stechford (Mr. Roy Jenkins). I know that the hon. Gentleman is particularly interested in the problems of merging computer tapes. To reassure him on that point, I should say that in order for individuals to be identified it would be necessary to steal the individual household tapes, to know in which order they were placed, and to steal the key which describes the information entered on the tapes. They will certainly not be issued from the Census Office.

§ Mr. Huckfield
Not true.

§ Mr. Burden
Is it not also true that people who do not wish to send their completed Census forms through the post or hand them to the enumerator may seal them in an envelope and hand them to the enumerator?

§ Mr. Whitelaw
I understand that to be so.

§ Mr. Atkinson
Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that many of the misgivings have arisen from the fact that many enumerators live in the same street as the area for which they are responsible, or in the same block of flats, as is the case in my constituency? Therefore, should not all enumerators be instructed that where they are working in circumstances like that they should inform the 820 persons concerned that they have a right to send their forms direct to the office rather than hand them to the enumerator?

§ Mr. Whitelaw
In view of the excellent service given by the enumerators in the past, it is important that the House should once again express its complete confidence in their integrity. I note what the hon. Gentleman says, and I shall ask the Registrar General to look into that point.

§ Mr. Chapman
Bearing in mind the need for the information asked for in the Census forms and the particularly desperate need in areas of high immigrant concentration, will my right hon. Friend use the Government's good offices to suggest to the very few immigrant leaders who have encouraged their followers not to sign or complete the forms that they should reverse their statements so that there may be a full and factual grasp of information in those areas?

§ Mr. Whitelaw
I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that question, knowing as I do his particular interest and the way in which he handles the question in his constituency. I hope that what has been said in the House today by the right hon. Member for Stechford and hon. Members on both sides will lead the immigrant communities and their leaders to feel reassured, and that the leaders will therefore help by suggesting to their followers that it is in their own interests to complete the forms.

§ Mr. Arthur Lewis
A person could accidentally or deliberately fill in the wrong information, or he might not know the answer to the questions. If there is to be absolute secrecy within the Departments, will there be a check? Obviously, if action is to be taken, possibly resulting in a fine, there much be a check somewhere to see whether the information given is correct. There may be plenty of people who honestly do not know where their parents were born and can only go by what their deceased parents may have told them. They may well put down incorrect information. If there is 100 per cent. secrecy, where and how will there be a check, when other Departments are not to be consulted?

§ Mr. Whitelaw
The problem the hon. Gentleman raises is one with which many 821 of us in the House may have some sympathy. When I considered filling in a form myself I had to make an extensive check before I discovered some of the information. But this has happened before in previous Censuses, and I do not think that it has given the sort of trouble to which the hon. Gentleman refers.