OTTAWA—The Conservative government listened to only a relative handful of Canadians — including conspiracy theorists afraid the government was going to round them up — before scrapping the mandatory long-form census, according to documents obtained by the Toronto Star.

Canadians were unhappy with so-called intrusive questions, the aggravation of filling it out and even a few were convinced the census was part of a government plot, according to Statistics Canada documents obtained under Access to Information.

But there is virtually no overwhelming evidence in the Statistics Canada documents to support the government’s contention of widespread privacy concerns — the very argument it used this summer to kill the mandatory long-form census.

The Toronto Star had requested all complaints to Statistics Canada with respect to the 2006 long-form census after cabinet ministers claimed they scuttled the long-form census after being flooded with complaints.

But according to the information provided to the Toronto Star, less than 100 complaints were lodged with StatsCan, even though about 20 per cent of Canadian households received the long form.

One concerned Canadian told StatsCan officials that in the “1940s the United States used census to find and detain Japanese people living in the country” and said “I wouldn’t be surprised” if the government in Ottawa did the same. The U.S. has denied this allegation.

Another stated: “I recently received the census to fill out. I am totally shocked at the type of questions being asked. The whole thing looks like it was written by the Nazis. This form goes way beyond what information is required for services in the community.”

While not exactly one or two complaints as the opposition parties would have people believe, it’s a far cry from the thousands of complaints that former industry minister Maxime Bernier said he was receiving.

“Of course, we always take Canadians’ views and opinions into account when considering public policy issues,” Industry Minister Tony Clement told the Star.

But opposition critics in Ottawa say it’s hard to believe that a relative few in a country of more than 30 million could sway a government to kill a valuable information tool such as the mandatory form census.

“Those numbers are statistically insignificant and don’t justify this ham-handed, arbitrary, unilateral scuttling of an important, necessary instrument. I think you have the evidence right there that this was a pure ideological crusade not based on reason, logic or any particular constituency,” NDP MP Pat Martin said.

At last count there were more than 400 groups, including municipalities, experts and individuals, opposed to the Harper government’s decision to replace the mandatory form with a voluntary long-form census, arguing that the information won’t be have any credibility.

The Conservative government decision, said Liberal Marc Garneau, remains “a triumph of ignorance over common sense.

“Hundreds of well recognized and respected organizations have said this is insanity,” he said.

Clement has repeatedly said that the threat of imprisonment for not filling out the mandatory long-form census played a large part in the government’s decision, even though a Canadian has never been jailed for refusing to fill out the form.

Some complainants even told StatsCan they weren’t filling it out even if they were fined $500 and jailed for three months.

But even when opposition parties agreed that the jail sentence threat should be dropped, the Conservatives still went ahead and replaced it with a voluntary census, arguing that Canadians believed the form was too invasive.

This was not borne out by Canada’s privacy watchdog who reported last year during the debate that it had received just three complaints about the census in the last decade.

Ivan Fellegi, who served as StatsCan’s chief statistician for more than two decades, told the Star the bulk of complaints were never about privacy.

“There really wasn’t any substantial indication of privacy concerns and when it came to formal complaints to the Privacy Commissioner I think she mentioned three … that’s certainly not a groundswell of concern by Canadians by any stretch of the imagination,” he said.

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Fellegi said the decision to scrap the mandatory long form was taken “without any consultation with anybody that I can identify — anybody.”

Meanwhile, Liberal MP Carolyn Bennett’s private member’s bill to reinstate the long-form census passed second reading in the House of Commons before the Christmas break and now moves onto the committee stage to be examined in detail before a third reading. Tory MPs voted unanimously against the bill.

Despite the private member’s bill and court challenges, it will be almost impossible to reinstate the mandatory long-form questionnaire in time for next spring’s census.

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