Mr. Speaker, I do not think this lessens the duty and obligation of the government one bit. The way my colleague phrases it, he seems to imply that this information is wasted because no one may use it. That is not the point.
The Government of Canada may have access to it and use it for its own actuarial assumptions, or even historical tracking of growth periods or ethnic diversity. The point is should it be made public, should it be open to anyone who wishes to see it?
The information is not wasted. The information is not lost. It exists for the exclusive use of the government of the day. The question remains, should that information from 1901 to 1911 be released when it did contain statutory provisions of confidentiality? The enumerators of the day told people that it was confidential information. They were dealing with people from areas of the world who may have been reluctant to share that information because they had fled from persecution and had a distrust of government, a healthy and warranted distrust of government, I might add. They were guaranteed confidentiality and in some cases in perpetuity.
Do we want to turn our backs on that just because the promise is 100 years old?