How ever much I enjoy history, and the things that have been learnt from the use of Census, I believe in this day and age where we live in a society where the government cares little about individuals, that we would be subjected to fill in a form containing personal information.
In a society where its easy to find personal information about people, target them with advertising, or sell their details to another company, in a time where we can be conned into buying something without realising or been pressured into it, that we feel its needed to give away even more information?
How are we sleeping safely a night knowing people can find out anything they want from us with a simple click of a button or passing of money?
Can we really justify this information sharing, especially after the few incidents where 25,000 citizens private and personal information were just 'lost' by incompetent people, in just one example of the data loss. This may only be a fraction of the population, but if just £15 can be made from each of those 25,000 peoples information (from just that instance) that's £375,000 of profit, just selling on the information, the buyer maybe a debt firm, credit company or a company offering a specific service targeted at you from what data they receive. If you end up buying into it it might be a deal that makes them a couple of thousand pounds long term, obviously not everyone will be in the same boat or take up their offer, that's why information can be sold so cheaply. (The £15 is a estimate, it could be extremely lower)
But back to the main point, there's a company called Lockheed Martin who specialise in creating Trident nuclear missiles, cluster bombs and F-16 fighter jets, this American company has paid a £150 million bid (other companies bid to buy) contract to run the census on behalf of the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
Now... at what point does a company who states (In the Guardian Article) that;
"No personal census data will be handled or seen by any American-owned company. No Lockheed Martin employees will see or handle any personal census data. The public can be reassured that their personal details from the census will be kept confidential and will remain so for 100 years,"
Then why do companies bid for the Census...? If there's no profit in the use of the data, I don't see the significance, it's beyond me, I've checked the internet, not much luck in finding why. I've asked this question on Yahoo Answers and hopefully will get an informative answer.
So as of now, all I can assume is the information somewhere will be compromised, in this day and age it makes just as much sense to count Facebook accounts. Big Brother keeps getting bigger and bigger.
So I ask you to defend your privacy, you don't owe the government anything, because we are in enough debt as it is, we are fighting for our voice, which is ignored far too often, we need to get louder and pro-active!
I would consider filling in the Census if it had an important effect on decisions in our society, (Not to say the decisions made with it aren't important... schools, hospital funding etc) like if it had a question, 'We're we right to invade Iraq?' 'Should defending our country involve INVADING another?' and so on, things that will give the true opinion of the people a chance, because we don't have enough of a say on what's going on.
If David Cameron decides to send us to Libya and fuck us/it up for the civilians and get our troops killed then i'm going to flip my lid at his atrocities.
So, lets boycott the Census and tell the government what we really think, Surely the act of refusing to fill out the census is important information gathering...
[Edit] The contract is £450million of potential profit (The Budget), however I read that it will cost £438 million although the gaurdian says 'administration costs have spiralled to an estimated £480m' I just don't see the room for profit.
The Guardian link to the Boycott - http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/feb/19/census-boycott-lockheed-martin
The Guardian link to the government costs - http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2010/oct/07/2011-census-creates-35000-jobs
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