COUNTING HEADS

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 94, 15 January 1936, Page 8

COUNTING HEADS

Plans For Census Well Tn Hand MUCH WORK INVOLVED Information Required From Public Preparations are well in hand for the taking of the census in New Zealand on March 24. Although the actual distribution and collection of the census returns is completed within a few days, the preliminary work entailed iu making the necessary arrangements for the official count Oi. the Dominion’s population requires as many months and longer. Close attention to detail in the initial preparations is essential to the success of the census. Even the date upon which it. is to be taken needs very careful consideration, for it is desirable to take the .census when the population is as stationary us possible. Holidays, week-ends, and other periods when there is anything in the nature of a definite movement of population must, therefore, be avoided. For the purpose of the census the country is divided in 82 districts, each under the control of an Enumerator. Each district contains one or more complete counties with interior boroughs and town districts. For the actual distribution and-collection of the schedules, some 1250 Sub-enumerators will be employed. The distribution will commence about a fortnight before the census date, and the collection on the day following the census. Information Required.

Questions will be asked under the following heads in respect of each individual in ajhousehold: Name, relationship to liead of household, 'sex, age, marital status, orphanhood, dependent children, industry, occupation, occupational status (employer, wage-earner, etc.), unemployment, religion, birthplace, duration of residence, race, war service, income, and domicile. In addition to these questions an occupier will be required to give particulars relating to his dwelling much on the same lines of that asked for at the last census, which was taken in 1926. These particulars will include information as to rent, tenure, number of rooms, and material of which the dwelling is constructed. In the ease of hospitals, hotels and similar institutions a personal schedule will be provided for each individual, as well as for boarders, lodgers, visitors, etc., in private families. In the North Island a special schedule will be provided for the Maori population with the questions set out in both the Maori and English languages. The European schedule will be used for the Maoris in the South Island, for in the south there gre very few members of the Native race, most of whom arc Europeanised. First for Ten Years.

This will be the first census since 1926, the one due to be held in 1931 being cut out on account of the financial difficulties of the country at that time. Not only on account of the lapse of time since the last one, hut for other reasons that are obvious, the forthcoming census will probably be the most important in the history of the Dominion, the results of which will be eagerly awaited. The Government Statistician’s in-ter-censal estimates of population of divisions of the country have been found in the main very accurate, but the ■ liability to error after a lapse of ten years is not merely twice that expected in a five-year period, but. more likely to be four times as great. The movement of population as a result of the depression has made it more difficult for the Government Statistician to secure information from which to compile bis estimates. At the same time, however, special efforts 'have been made by officers of the Census and Statistics Office to keep track of these people, and they are confident that their estimates of population of divisions of the country will lie found to be not very wide of the mark.