§ Mr. FraserTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what supplementary inquiries and research and other work was carried out by the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys to supplement the census return in Lambeth and to obtain additional information about numbers and details of persons whose details ought to appear as part of the census.
§ Mr. SackvilleCensus enumerators had the task of locating, contacting, and delivering census forms to all households and communal establishments in their areas. Census statistics have been derived principally from the completed forms. Where enumerators located households they believed to be present on census night, but were not able to contact people in them, the numbers and details of the people and households concerned have been estimated and included in the census statistics. Households identified by enumerators as absent on census night were asked to fill in a census form voluntarily on their return. For those who did not complete a form, numbers and details have been estimated and included in the census statistics.
A census validation survey was carried out shortly after the census to check on its quality and coverage. This survey compared information given on census forms with that obtained by experienced interviewers who re-visited a sample of addresses. The sample was not large enough, however, to provide information directly about individual authorities. A report on the survey's findings on coverage will be published later this year.
In preparing the Registrar General's mid-1991 population estimates, allowances were made for under-enumeration in the census, using results from the census validation survey and all other relevant sources. For individual local authorities these adjustments are inevitably less precise than at the national level.