EXTRACTS FROM HANSARD -- PROCEEDINGS OF CANADA'S SENATE :

Debates of the Senate (Hansard)
1st Session, 36th Parliament,
Volume 137, Issue 92
Tuesday, November 17, 1998
The Honourable Gildas L. Molgat, Speaker



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Access to Census Information
Inquiry-Debate Adjourned

Hon. Lorna Milne rose pursuant to notice of October 27, 1998:

That she will call the attention of the Senate to the lack of access to the 1906 and all subsequent censuses caused by an Act of Parliament adopted in 1906 under the Government of Sir Wilfrid Laurier.

She said: Honourable senators, in 1918, the Borden government passed a new Statistics Act. While this does not sound particularly innovative, there was a clause in this act which is currently causing a great deal of consternation.

Clause 15(1) reads, in part:


No individual return, and no part of an individual return, made, and no answer to any question put, for the purposes of this Act, shall, without the previous consent in writing of the person... be published, nor, except for the purposes of a prosecution under this Act, any person not engaged in connection with the Census be permitted to see any such individual return or any such part of any individual return.


This clause codified what had been merely a regulation under the Laurier government, and only in effect since the 1906 western census. From that time forward, there would be no access to individual census returns except by the person who completed them. While this happened a long time ago, and does not sound very important now, from now on it will have a tremendous impact upon genealogists, demographic researchers and historians.

In the United States, census data can be accessed after 72 years, and in Great Britain after 100 years. Up until now, anyone researching in Canada has been able to access individual census data after 92 years. However, because of this law, the 1901 census will be the last individual data that will ever be available to researchers. I have been informed that 7.5 million people in this country are involved in genealogical research. Obviously, the researchers for these people are very concerned about this situation.

A letter sent out by the Upper Ottawa Valley Genealogical Group, of which I am a member, states:


The data on census forms has been helpful in tracing family trees; it has helped in tracing medical problems passed along in genealogical lines. Family lineage has also successfully been used in court cases to prove lineage and settle inheritance legalities.

Genealogical research is a boon to the Canadian tourist industry. Anyone who is involved in researching their family history usually consults the census reports released by Statistics Canada. After locating useful information, these researchers end up visiting the various locations in Canada where their ancestors lived.


Thousands of people come from around the world each year to do this. The letter goes on to state:


They spend hard cash for meals, accommodation, transportation and souvenirs... Not to mention film for their cameras.

Genealogy is one of the fastest growing hobbies and businesses. Numerous Canadian companies do millions of dollars worth of business yearly in this field, from researchers, publishers and writers to suppliers of software, books, et cetera. There are at least 35 publishers in Canada whose main publishing interest is family history.

There are approximately 500 genealogical societies and groups across the country, and every province has an overall provincial society.

Almost every family has someone who is doing family research.


Honourable senators, I am the genealogist in my family. I have published three family histories, and I know how invaluable the census data was in tracing those families. It was an absolutely essential research tool for reconstructing the family unit and tracing them back by 10-year periods. Essentially, it provided a snapshot in time.

I look around this chamber and, in spite of what many Canadians presently suspect, none of us were born before 1923. Thus, unless this law is rescinded, none of our descendants will ever have the wonderful experience of finding us in the census. While this information may not be as necessary in later years, given computerized records, photography and other technological advances, consulting the census is still an important method of tracing your family, and always will be.

Another group which this old law will substantially impact are historians. They use the census to trace trends in Canada - that is, social mobility in individual families, changes in neighbourhood settlement patterns, birth rates, literacy rates, reported religious affiliation, and so on. They often follow families who have been living in the same house for decades, and manage to reconstruct some idea of what life was like at that time. By cutting out this source of information we are limiting the access that Canadian historians have to information about our past.

As the prominent historian, Father Joseph Gravelle of Otter Lake, Quebec, said before his death in 1971:


Genealogy is not concerned with Blue Bloods and First Families but rather with the Little People who made up the backbone of the country, who pioneered and settled and made their own contributions in their small and untrumpeted ways.


That is true for history, too. If we cut off access to information about the "Little People," then the only ones who will be written about will be the "Blue Bloods," the "First Families" and the business tycoons of this country. This skew will become obvious in literature written about Canada.

To be fair, I must give the other side of the picture as well. This issue cannot be seen strictly in black and white. A serious concern which rests on the other side of the issue is privacy. By allowing access to this information, we are changing the rules under which the information was collected. We must ask ourselves how we would feel if it were our personal data that was being used 92 years in the future.

Furthermore, in his 1994-95 report, the Privacy Commissioner recommended that all personalized records from the 1991 census, as well as all other census records not already in the public domain, be destroyed once Statistics Canada has processed the data to ensure its accuracy and quality. This solution would require Statistics Canada to seek an amendment to the census retention and disposal schedule approved by the National Archivist under the National Archives of Canada Act. Luckily, Statistics Canada never agreed to do this, and the 1991 census is still safely maintained. However, the concerns of the Privacy Commissioner do need to be addressed.

How does the release of personal information from a census interfere with a person's right to privacy, particularly when that privacy has been guaranteed even though 92 years may have passed?

Let me close by saying that I am greatly concerned by this lack of access to census data. Through this change, we will destroy a growing Canadian industry, as well as distinguish Canada as being the one nation in the western hemisphere which does not welcome and encourage people to research their families. However, privacy concerns must be balanced with the wish of people to access this kind of information. Perhaps through debate we can develop some ideas about how these two concerns might be balanced. I invite my fellow senators to involve themselves in a discussion of this matter. I feel that it is important, and something which definitely needs to be addressed.

Hon. John B. Stewart: Honourable senators, I have a question that I wish to pose to the Honourable Senator Milne.

I notice that she did not put forward her own proposal as to what should be done to address the situation that she has described.

Would the honourable senator consider having a bill drafted to address the problem, with the notion that the bill would be given second reading quickly? We would then go into committee with the understanding that the clauses in that bill would not be regarded as sacrosanct, but could be amended to achieve the kind of balance suggested by Senator Milne.

Honourable senators, I am afraid that nothing will be achieved if we go on debating without having a document before us, and the disastrous effects to which Senator Milne referred will be upon us. I propose that solution to Senator Milne as a modus operandi and ask if she has any thoughts on it.

Senator Milne: I thank the honourable senator for his question. My honourable friend's thoughts follow along exactly the same lines as mine. I was hoping there would be some debate in this place on the matter before I started work on drafting a bill, which I am seriously considering. Perhaps I should move a motion asking the Senate to refer the matter to a committee for further study. Out of that committee study might then come a Private Member's Bill.

On motion of Senator Johnson, debate adjourned.