Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for the opportunity to address some of his concerns. I will address those concerns one by one.
The hon. member talks about the long form being scrapped, and I will correct him in that. In fact, the long form has not been scrapped. It has been transitioned to a different format that is no longer mandatory and will no longer threaten Canadians with jail time and fines simply because they do not want to answer questions such as what their religion is or how much yardwork they did last week.
In fact, one of the common misconceptions, which the Liberals have done nothing to correct, is that the short form has been scrapped, that somehow the census has been scrapped. In fact, the short form census still exists. The census that most Canadians would equate with the word census still exists in the same form that has existed for decades. All Canadians will still have to answer questions about their age, where their houses are and how many people live in their houses and marital status. Those basic questions still exist in the census.
In terms of intrusion, the hon. member says that no one complained about this. That is interesting because he obviously has not talked to his Liberal colleague from Richmond Hill, who took the time to write on behalf of his constituents. He said:
They are primarily concerned with the great deal of personal information they are required to fill out and therefore potential invasions of privacy....I share this constituents concerns...
In regard to the threat of jail or the threats being faced by those who do not want to fill out the mandatory long form census, the hon. member downplays that.
However, let us talk about the reality of new Canadians, for example, who, for whatever reason, do not want to tell the government what their religion is. There may be many reasons. I do not know what the reason would be. If people tell the enumerator that they do not want the enumerator how much yardwork they did, or what their religion is or how many bedrooms are in their house, the enumerator, in the process of his or her job, has to fill out a total refusal form.
It interesting that at the top of this total refusal form, it instructs the enumerator that, “The information provided in the following sections may be used to support a legal prosecution”. That sounds fairly threatening. Further on in the total refusal form the enumerator has to fill out, again keeping in mind that these are people who simply do not want to tell the government what their religion is or how much yardwork they did last week, the enumerator has to fill out a section which says, “Description of the person who refused (e.g. age, gender, height, weight, other physical details such as facial hair, tattoos, glasses, birthmarks, distinctive clothing, etc.)”.
That does sound threatening. It does sound a little over the top for a Canadian citizen who simply does not want to tell the government what his or her religion is or how many bedrooms are in his or her house.