§ Mr. BeithTo ask the Secretary of State for Health whether he has any plans for either a statement advertising or a statement on the census form to assure members of the public that information provided in their answers to census questions will not be used to compile registers for any local government tax.
§ Mr. DorrellPersonal information from the completed census forms will not be made available to anyone outside the census offices, including those compiling registers for the community charge or any other local charge. It would be against the law to do so. The following message is included in the information leaflet which will be delivered to every household with the census form: 549W
The information you put on your census form is used only to produce statistics. The Census Offices and their staff are bound by law to make sure that the information you give on your form remains secret and safe. The completed forms will be kept confidential and only used to produce information about the population in general. The Census Offices will not give any information about identified people or households to anyone else, in central government or elsewhere.Further, each census form contains a personal assurance from the Registrar-General that the answers will be treated in strict confidence and used only to produce statistics.
The census offices are also publicising the message elsewhere, for example, in background leaflets, posters and advertisements.