Oct 132006
 

The light dawns slowly sometimes … duh! 

The mailman brought a registered letter two days ago.  It’s from Ivan Felligi, Canada’s Chief Statistician.  Newcomers to our network won’t know what that’s about. 

Old-timers will know:  the letter says that the matter between Ivan and me will be referred to the Judicial system.  Jail time and a fine are possibilities (for me, not him!!) 

There have been a few media reports about the high rate of non-compliance with the 2006 census.  The cause has been attributed, for example, to a transient population (e.g. Alberta). 

If you are in the email networks you know what the media is not telling:

the Government contracted-out part of the 2006 census to Lockheed-Martin Corporation which is part of the American military machine.  People have refused to co-operate with the census as a form of protest or resistance. 

My first communication to the Government about their plans to “out-source” to Lockheed-Martin was in 2003.  The Quaker people in Halifax sent an excellent letter of protest (2004-02) .  Sylvia Mangalam was the secretary of the Quaker meeting that sent this letter to the Government about Lockheed-Martin.  I phoned Sylvia today and have sent a copy of my communication to Ivan Felligi, Chief Statistician, to her and other Quakers. 

There are a number of reasons why the census should not have been out-sourced but the Lockheed-Martin situation is pivotal. 

 We worked with the Government on the GDR (Government Directive on Regulating) which is part of so-called “Smart Regulations”.  I used the GDR to reinforce the point about the census, telling the Government that Canadians are learning non-compliance with regulations.  I told them there will be a high level of non-compliance with the census for very legitimate reasons, if they do not change their direction.  It isn’t hard to figure out, from all the protest. The rule of law in Canada is being undermined which is a very serious situation. 

Corruption, governments in bed with the people they are supposed to regulate, the complete failure to regulate to protect “the commons”, the gun registry, contracting-out to corporations like Lockheed-Martin, etc. etc.  – all PREDICTABLY lead to a loss of confidence and consequent disrespect for the laws of the land.  Definitely not a good place to be.   You can point this out to the Government, but they seem incapable of hearing. 

I have continued to communicate with Ivan Felligi about the census.  A Statistics Canada person (INSERT:  Anil Arora who later became the Crown’s witness in my trial) phoned me and we talked the matter through, or so I thought. 

I have participated in the on-line support network at Vive le Canada.  These are people who have resisted the census in various ways.

Statistics Canada personnel also watch the site.  There is a recent posting from one of them. (UPDATE:  the web-page no longer exists.)

“Count Me Out” is another web-site for the sharing of information. 

There are thousands of people across Canada who have not complied, many of them for the same reason: Lockheed-Martin.  On July 5th we circulated in our network the report that 400,000 adults in British Columbia alone had not sent in their census forms – 10% of the population.  The Government stepped up efforts to gain compliance.  They do not disseminate the information on how many people have sabotaged the census in various ways, from the provision of inaccurate  information up to refusal to submit. 

The letter I received this week from Ivan Felligi tells me,  If your completed questionnaire is not received by Statistics Canada by October 27, 2006, I will turn the matter over to the Department of Justice with a recommendation that appropriate charges be laid….

Further, if I am tried and found guilty of an offence under the Statistics Act,  I may be liable to a fine not exceeding five hundred dollars or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months, or both. 

The reason given by Ivan for why the census form from me is required, is simply not true.  It is contained in my reply to him (copy below). 

Now here’s the pickle and the slow dawning of the light:  I didn’t connect this on-going battle over Government complicity with a company that makes its money through the killing of Iraqi people and their country – to – my running for the leadership of the Green Party of Saskatchewan.  Tomorrow no less! 

I should be happy the light dawned in time!  I have to tell “the Party” that if they elect me to the leadership, there may be an interruption while I am in jail!  They may not want a leader who is “in trouble with the law”. 

Geez!  How does the world come to this absurdity?!  It’s worth a laugh.  But if I laugh about it, I might get the injection and be locked up in the Psychiatric Ward again.  (Another story for newcomers!)  Psychiatric ward, jail – not much difference.  Except that you might be allowed to openly express your humour and laughter in the latter. 

Oh dear. 

The following is my letter to Ivan Felligi, head of Statistics Canada.  I have cc’d it to the President of Lockheed-Martin Canada, Martin Munro.  And to Maxime Bernier, who, as the Minister for Industry Canada is responsible for Statistics Canada. 

======================= 

SUBJECT:  Census Data 

October 13, 2006

TO:

Ivan Felligi

Chief Statistician of Canada

Ivan.P.Fellegi@statcan.ca 

CC:  Industry Canada

Minister Responsible for Statistics Canada Maxime Bernier

minister.industry@ic.gc.ca   613-995-9001 

Cc: Jacques.Morin@a.statcan.ca; Lyne.St.John@a.statcan.ca 

CC:  Lockheed-Martin,   President (Canadian operations)

Martin Munro   

martin.munro@lmco.ca  613-599-3270 ext 3498 (Martin’s exec asst, Diane Grandy)

Dear Ivan, 

I am in receipt of your registered letter dated October 3, 2006. 

It does not address my reason for non-compliance with the census, communicated to you consistently and beginning back in 2003. 

The reason you provide for the necessity of compliance with the census is not truth.  I presume that if your reason is an untruth, it is because you do not have a truthful reason to offer. 

I would be failing my responsibilities as a citizen were I to bow in cowardice to anyone, civil servant or otherwise,  who attempts to intimidate me with the threat of the judicial system –  jail time and fines – when there is no reasonable basis. 

Lockheed-Martin is a large part of the American war machine.  I will not, through complicity, add to their financial profits.  I communicated this to you more than two years before the census, as did many other Canadians. 

If I am to be treated equally before the Law, then you must equally refer the thousands of other Canadians who have not complied with the census to the Judicial system.  I presume you are doing this. 

The reason you have provided for the necessity of my compliance, quoting from your letter of October 3, 2006 is:

      “A compulsory response is required of all respondents because the census is essential for providing the information needed by governments, businesses, researchers and individual Canadians to shed light on issues that are critical to virtually every sector of society.  If respondents were to arbitrarily choose whether or not they would answer the census questions, the result would not accurately reflect the characteristics of the population and would therefore not be considered useful or reliable.” 

I am sorry to say, but that is a load of bull.  Most people off the street know it’s not the way statistics work.  I find it offensive that citizens are treated as though they are ignorant.  In my particular case, I am a graduate of the College of Commerce, University of Saskatchewan.  I majored in Quantitative Analysis (Statistics) and graduated with Honours.  Every day we are provided with reliable statistical information not based on 100% sampling. 

I repeat my point:  if you must resort to blatant untruths I presume it is because you don’t have a valid argument to offer. 

Another point I would like to make:  you chose to define the Canadian census in a way that necessitated the out-sourcing. 

On your website you record that the first census in Canada was conducted in 1666, the first national census in 1871. For centuries and decades the Government has defined the census in a way that civil servants had the capability of doing the work.  To me, quite frankly, it is prudent to keep one’s work within the limits you are capable of managing. 

If the Government is not capable of doing that which has been successfully managed by civil servants for decades and centuries, then the answer is to fire those responsible for the mismanagement.  The answer is not to knowingly create some over-sized census monster which weakens one’s capabilities and then dictates an attitude of “I am so weakened I must rely on Big Daddy LM to help me out.” 

Statistics Canada and its employees are to serve the interests of the citizens of Canada.  Previous administrations have done that very well.  If not, there would have been problems in the past.  I am not aware of any.  So I suggest that you need to re-think what you are doing. 

Third and final point:  in the last paragraph of your letter you say, “I would like to assure you that the information you provide on your census questionnaire will be kept strictly confidential, …”. 

I reassure children so they may feel safe and secure.  I think you mis-read the situation:  I am secure, I am an adult.  I do not need to be reassured by you.  I will arrive at my own conclusions by observing your actions and by reading what you write. 

Furthermore, not once in my communications with the Government have I mentioned concerns about the confidentiality of information.  I have been clear and explicit in the reason for my non-compliance.  You repeat this mantra about confidentiality.  Not once have you addressed or attempted to address my explicitly-stated reason for non-compliance:  the Statistics Canada contract with Lockheed-Martin enriches a corporation that plays a very large role in the American killing machine. 

I am not being snooty.  I am not “radical”.  I come from rural Saskatchewan which is small “c” conservative country.  I am “mature”, a Mother of 2 children.  I do not believe in increasing the hatred in the world through killing other people and their children.  Lockheed-Martin profits from the killing. 

I don’t know into which pigeon hole you have slotted me.  I am able to think.  I can connect the dots between my actions and wider outcomes.  I was a member of and benefited from the Girl Guides of Canada for many years.  I learned service to community.  That community and sisterhood extends to women in all countries of the world.  I had the privilege of attending an international camp.  I slept in the same tent, cooked, laughed and danced with these women when they and I were young.  I really don’t like seeing them killed, as in Iraq.  That’s killed, as in dead. Why would I participate in, or be a collaborator with Lockheed-Martin?  Perhaps you have not read the Washington Post, October 11?  655,000 more people have died in Iraq since coalition forces arrived in March 2003 than would have died if the invasion had not occurred (research overseen by epidemiologists at Johns Hopkins University’s Bloomberg School of Public Health).  The killing, once started, does not stop. 

You were told by thousands of Canadians that Lockheed-Martin is a large part of the American war machine.  You made a bad decision to “out-source”. 

Your letter of October 3 is an attempt to coerce me through the threat of jail time and fines.  Were my plate not full at the moment, did I not have more important priorities, I would be researching the avenues through which to lay charges, to “turn the matter over to the Department of Justice”, as you say.  So that you might be tried for your tactics vis-a-vis me. 

Yours truly,

Sandra Finley

Saskatoon, SK   S7N 0L1

306-373-8078

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