The Current - Why the census matters more than you think

Episode Date: May 11, 2026

From housing costs and commuting habits to language, identity and family life, Canadians are once again being asked detailed questions in this year’s census. So what is Statistics Canada trying to learn from all of it? And how does that information shape everything from political representation to schools, transit and public policy? Matt Galloway speaks with Geoff Bowlby, Assistant Chief Statistician at Statistics Canada.

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Every five years, Canadians get a form in the mail asking questions about our lives, questions like, what language do you speak at home, who lives in your house or apartment? This year, questions touching on homelessness, health status, and more are part of that questionnaire. And for a lot of us, the census is one of those things you fill out quickly, and then you forget about. But taken together, the answers to those questions become something much larger, a portrait of this country, who we are and how we are. are changing. Jeff Bolby is assistant chief statistician at Statistics Canada. Jeff, good morning. Good morning.

Tomorrow is Census Day. That's the day that the census is due. But to you, is it like the most wonderful time of the year? It is. You know, and we're in the second week of what we get very excited about census time here at Stack. It's a little like, you know, Christmas, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day all sort of wrapped up into one for our statisticians. When you ask, you people about things that, you know, shape their lives, who they are, how many people live in their house, the languages you speak, what have you. How does that, just broadly, we'll get into specifics, but how does that benefit Canadians? You know, there's so many ways that it benefits Canadians. You know, the population estimate is the number one reason why we produce a census. And if you

think about how often we all need population data, it's a basic thing. You know, we're all familiar in Canada with the population size of the towns and cities that we live in because they're all on the city limit side. So we're all very well illiterate in population numbers in Canada. You know, the census is data used for the delineation of our writing. So MPs, MPAs, MLAs, MHAs, whatever your politician is called in this country, their writing is determined by population data. But there's, you know, so many other important reasons why people should fill out the census.

The population numbers are used for determining where schools are placed or hospitals or police stations or fire stations. So very fundamental, basic part of our statistical infrastructure here in Canada is coming from the census. Why does Statscan need to know what time I leave for work? Well, that's part of the transit planning. You know, the census data are the best source of commuting patterns. So transit planners all across the country will use information on where we live and where we work. We collect both of those on the long-form census. And when people leave in the morning is important part, of course, of commuting patterns.

So transit routes, road placement, those decisions are based on census data like you just described. You will have seen the headline in the Beaverton, the satirical website that said, local nerd disappointed he didn't get the long form census. The headline might have been talking about me, local nerd, who did not get the long form census, because it's fun to fill out. It's a lot of information. It takes time. But what's in that long form census for people who did not get that?

What is the difference between that and perhaps the quick survey that they received? Yeah, the short form census goes to three and four dwellings and the long form goes to one and four dwellings. dwellings across the country. And the short form is, as you know, as the name describes, very short, it's about 12 questions. And it's basic purpose is to count the population and provide us with some very basic information about Canadian household. So age, sex, gender, and language questions are on the short form. Everything else is on the long form. The long form includes the short form questions I just described, but it also has ethnicity, indigenous status, some immigration questions, education, labor, questions about the nature of our dwelling. And it's where we also

have some new questions. We have questions on homelessness, health status, as well as sexual orientation in the 26 census. You will have seen on social media, a protest such as it is, a number of people and I don't know what that number is, but social media amplifies these things. People who get the census and then they write return to sender and they're sending it back. They say it's an invasion of their privacy. They want nothing to do with it. What do you make of that? Well, I say two things.

You know, first of all, a census isn't a census unless close to 100% of the population responds to us, right? So in the past, we've been very successful in Canada. We're the envy of our census-taking colleagues around the world. We got 98% response to the census. our target again in 2026. That's what we got five years ago. So, you know, the quality of the data depends on people responding and the quality of the decisions that result from the data also will be impacted. So therefore, you know, you're not doing yourself any favor, your community any favor by not responding to the census. It's only going to mean those factors like I described

earlier, placement of schools, hospitals, et cetera, that big, decisions of fundamental government services are degraded in some way because the data aren't as good. Now, I know people are concerned about privacy and confidentiality. And, you know, what I would like to say is that, you know, StackCAN takes that to the utmost seriousness. Protecting one's privacy and confidentiality is the number one job of StackCAN. We know that trust is our currency.

You know, if Canadians couldn't trust us. with their data, they wouldn't respond. And there's good reasons to trust us. One, the Statistics Act, which governs my activity, says that any data collected stays within the walls of Statscan. The second is that, you know, if we have a great incentive at Staccan to make sure, even if it wasn't required by law, we'd have a great incentive to make sure that we keep private information private.

it. And that's because if Canadians didn't trust us, they wouldn't respond. I have to let you go, but just very briefly, this is an exercise in democracy in some ways, right? You see it as key to our democracy. Absolutely, yes. So as I was mentioning earlier, the ridings are established by the population count. So every MP, every MPP, MLA across the country needs to represent a similar number of people to his or her. peers. So there's a, the boundaries of the ridings are very much determined by, by the population counts coming from the census. But there's also just a picture of who we are, right? Yeah, it is. You know, you think of Canada. It's this beautiful country with mountains and prairie and Canadian

shield, but it's the people. And in 2027, when we're producing the results, we'll be able to, you know, tell that story of who we are as Canadians through the census. This is your Super Bowl. Enjoy it, Jeff. And thank you very much for explaining. it all to us. Thank you very much. Jeff Bolby is Assistant Chief Statistician at Statistics Canada. He was in Ottawa. This has been the current podcast. You can hear our show Monday to Friday on CBC Radio 1 at 8.30 a.m. at all time zones. You can also listen online at cbc.ca.ca. Or on the CBC Listen app or wherever you get your podcasts. My name is Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening. For more CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca.ca.com.

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