TAKING OF CENSUS

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIX, Issue 122, 25 May 1945, Page 6

TAKING OF CENSUS

REASONS GIVEN

DECISION DEFENDED O.C. HAMILTON, This Day. Reasons for the taking of a census in New Zealand in September of this year were given by the Acting Prime Minister (Mr. Nash) last night, when he spoke in support of the Labour candidate in the Hamilton by-election. The Finance Act, 1940, said Mr. Nash, provided that the census which should normally have been held in 1941 should be postponed and that it should be taken in a year not later than 1945. . It was then contemplated that it might take place in any year between 1941 and 1945. Then, in order to get back into the ordinary swing of five-yearly censuses it was provided that the next census following should be taken in 1946. Obviously, it would be foolish and impracticable to have two censuses in consecutive years, and the Government would have to bring in legislation providing that only one census need be taken. The last census was held in March, 1936. If the census* this year had been held in the autumn, as was the usual time of the year for censuses, it would have been nine years after the last census. It was desirable, however, to approach as closely as was practicable to the ten-yearly period. On the other hand, if the census had been left until the autumn, 1946,- it would have been impossible for representation commissions to carry out their statutory obligations in time before the General Election. Accordingly, a compromise was effected by requiring the census to be taken in September, 1945. That gave a nine and a half-yearly period between the censuses—near enough to ten years, and at the same time would provide adequate time for representation commissions. VITAL. TO RECONSTRUCTION. Critics of the proposal that the census should be held this year should bear in mind that if it was postponed further the Dominion would be in the position of not having had a census for more than ten years. That was a state of affairs without precedent, and it would subject the Dominion to. the lack of a great deal of necessary information. Those people who insisted on the maintenance of quinquennial periods must realise that to postpone the censust further would mean postponing it until 1951. To those who found fault with the fact that the census was being taken in the spring instead of the autumn, as was customary, he would recall the fact that during the last war the census was taken in October, 1916. As he had said when he announced that the census would be taken—it was vital to the success of reconstruction plans of, the Dominion and particularly to servicemen's rehabilitation and housing that they had accurate knowledge of the social and industrial trends since 1936, and a clear picture of the location and needs of the people today.