Olivia Mitchell
Ceist:172 Ms O. Mitchell asked the Taoiseach if he will expedite the taking of the national census. [21916/01]
Written Answers. - National Census.
On 27 March 2001 the Government decided to postpone the Census of Population scheduled for Sunday, 29 April 2001 until Sunday, 28 April 2002. The decision was taken following the advice of the expert group on foot and mouth disease and after consultation with the Central Statistics Office and Departments. The following are the main reasons it was decided to postpone the taking of the census for a full year: it was not clear at the outset whether the FMD situation would have improved sufficiently in the shorter term to allow the census field work to go ahead; a date other than April would be out of phase with the long standing practice of staging censuses in the month of April thereby giving rise to inconsistencies in comparing demographic trends over time and the logistical problems of re-printing all materials, including census forms, and of reorganising the field force in a shorter period would be enormous.