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Statistics Canada

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Statistics Canada (French: Statistique Canada) is the Canadian federal government agency commissioned with producing statistics to help better understand Canada, its population, resources, economy, society, and culture. The bureau is commonly called StatCan or StatsCan although StatCan is the official abbreviation. It has regularly been considered the best statistical organization in the world by The Economist, [1] such as in the 1991 and 1993 "Good Statistics" surveys. Public Policy Forum and others have also ranked it first.[citation needed]

Statistics is a federal responsibility in Canada and Statistics Canada produces statistics for all the provinces as well as the federal government. In addition to conducting about 350 active surveys on virtually all aspects of Canadian life, Statistics Canada undertakes a country-wide census every five years on the first and sixth year of each decade. By law, every household must complete the census form.[2] The last Canadian census was held in May 2006, when an Internet version was made widely available for the first time.

Statistics Canada was formed in 1971, replacing the Dominion Bureau of Statistics. The Dominion Bureau of Statistics was formed in 1918.

Leadership

The head of Statistics Canada is the Chief Statistician of Canada. The heads of Statistics Canada and the previous organization, the Dominion Bureau of Statistics, are:

Legislation

Statistics Canada is governed by:

Publications

Statistics Canada publishes numerous documents covering a range of statistical information about Canada, including census data, economic and health indicators, immigration economics, income distribution, and social and justice conditions. It also publishes a peer-reviewed statistics journal, Survey Methodology. A press release on April 24, 2006, indicated that "effective today, all electronic publications on Statistics Canada's Web site will be available free of charge."[3] though these free publications are only overviews of the raw data, which can often be only available under CANSIM, a fee based service. Statistics Canada does not consider CANSIM to be part of its electronic publications, even though it is also available electronically.

Controversy

In July of 2010, controversy arose over changes to the long census forum to be used by Statistics Canada. The federal Minister of Industry Tony Clement announced the replacement of the mandatory long-form census with a voluntary national household survey. Munir Sheikh resigned as head of Statistics Canada in protest, throwing the agency into turmoil.[4] Minister Clement continues to dismiss calls from opposition MPs, statisticians, researchers, academics, municipalities, religious groups and others whom have decried the move. They argue it will result in skewed and unreliable data and limit the ability of policy-makers to make well-informed decisions.[5] Supporters argue that this is not the case.[6] They claim that census data is widely demonstrated as lagging behind rapid socio-demographic change and cite examples such as the over-crowding of schools and over-taxation of other public resources when rapid socio-demographic change out-paces census data, though this would not be addressed without increasing the frequency of the survey. They further cite the successful abandonment of census taking in Scandinavian countries and the emerging trend throughout Western Europe[7], although in these states the census is being replaced with a database of information on each citizen rather than a voluntary poll.

Terms

Statistics Canada uses a variety of terms to designate regions in Canada for statistical purposes:

References and notes

  1. ^ "Canadian Initiative on Social Statistics". Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. 2006-07-11. Retrieved 2006-11-05.
  2. ^ "The Census and University and College Students". Statistics Canada. 2006-03-13. Retrieved 2006-12-01.
  3. ^ "Access to Statistics Canada's electronic publications at no charge". Statistics Canada. 2006-04-24. Retrieved 2006-12-01.
  4. ^ [1]
  5. ^ [2]
  6. ^ [3]
  7. ^ [4]


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