census vs privacy

the census wants to know the current address, the name, sex, date of birth, relationship, marital status, origin, usual address, address one year ago, address five years ago, citizenship, country of birth, where mother and father were born, language spoken, who well english is known, ancestry, religion, how able, any need of assistance, any educational institution, type of educational system, highest level completed, extra certification, highest qualification, completed when, how many live births, total income, their job, self employed or have an employer, incorporated or not, how many people employed, person's occupation, main tasks, business name, workplace address, industry, goods produced, hours worked, transport to work, actively looking for work, unpaid domestic work, unpaid care, unpaid childcare, voluntary work, persons who usually live at dwelling, sex, date of birth or age, origin, relationship, how many bedrooms, what type of dwelling, rented, cost, access the internet, agree to name and address and other information being kept for 99 years, signature.

this is to help with infrastructure: roads, public transport, hospitals, churches, housing, schools ..

one might wonder what has a person's private address got to do with this, what does the birth place of their parents have to do with this, what does their signature have to do with this, their marital status, the full names of their children, where they lived previously, how many births ..

a lot of this information would be available in each municipality via rates, how many students attend local schools, kindergartens, how many children apply and can't fit in, letters and communications written to local councils from residents asking for infrastructure, company tax returns, company registrations and abn's, social security applications, and all manner of government databases of information ..

much of what is requested on the form is highly private information that isn't specifically needed to work out infrastructure such as full name, date of birth and address, place of parents birth, and just like voting in australia it is compulsory or be fined - which is not the democratic way. people should be given a choice if they want to supply this information and if so how much.

this legislation was brought in, in 1905, before anybody alive today even had a choice or a vote and in the act it says in section part II 8A (b) "a person has consented, in accordance with the form, to the information contained in the form being transferred to the custody of the archives under this section;"
it doesn't talk about whether or not a person consents to filling in the form to begin with - just they they HAVE to.

none of it helps with regard to important issues like homelessness (who aren't counted in the census), sexual inequality, porn addiction and the ramifications, lack of decent sex ed, global warming, how many people are apposed to fracking, gm foods, corporate greed, corporate raping of the planet .. all those big key issues the average joe never gets a real say in.

if you're going to collect date keep it impersonal and keep it real. make it about stuff that really matters.