§ Ms. HoeyTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what percentage of forms still have to be collected, nationally for the 1991 census; and what percentage still need to be collected in the London borough of Lambeth.
§ Mr. DorrellVirtually all 1991 census forms have now been collected. There were problems in contacting householders to collect completed forms, particularly in city areas, and special measures were introduced to deal with this. Initially a letter, a reply paid envelope, and another form were left at such households with a request that they post a completed form to the local census manager. This was followed by the setting up of a census freepost facility; and, in selected areas, where the proportion of households from whom a return had still not been received was reported to be substantially higher than the national average, a postal reminder was issued by the census office.
The estimate of the number of addresses where no household had been contacted was made by local field staff. The follow-up action, particularly the postal reminder issued by the census office, has indicated that some of this accommodation was not occupied on census 312W night. However, the measures described above, have reduced the initial estimate of the proportion of households which were not contacted to two-thirds of 1 per cent. for England and Wales as a whole. In the London borough of Lambeth, some 3,600 households were sent a postal reminder, and about 1,000 replies have already been received back. The overall percentage of addresses classified as non-contacts will be available only after the returns for Lambeth have been processed early next year.
A full evaluation of under-coverage, nationally and for inner London, will be possible in summer 1992 once the computer processed statistics and the results from the census validation survey are both available.