I for one would not mind if the data was actually used for some real good.

Unfortunately our politicians spend our hard earned taxes so badly it makes a complete mockery of the census having any real use or benefit.

We need a census every so often for the purposes of interested people wanting to study their family history.
These census's have been attended for over 200 years in Europe, and the sky hasn't fallen in.

Worrying about 'big brother' and 'communists' etc is sooo 1950's, and can be a sign of paranoia...

Dear Suse,

<<We need a census every so often for the purposes of interested people wanting to study their family history.>>

So if your grandmother doesn't want you to know about her, but rather sits at home (which happens to be in this continent) quietly all day and won't open the door to anyone, then you support sending people to repeatedly knock and disturb her peace, then ultimately if she still won't open, then you support them breaking her door down and if she still remains silent and doesn't answer their questions then you support them dragging your grandmother off to jail.

How nice...

Houellebecq, very well described.

579, if you are a disciple of left wing, atheistic, secular ANTI-humanism? why do you not understand evolution? have you ever heard of the term "indo-european languages"?

"This article contains characters used to write reconstructed Proto-Indo-European words. Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the linguistic reconstruction of the common ancestor of the Indo-European languages"

You know people migrated out of the Indian sub continent travelled north & west to arrive in Europe. Well the Aboriginal people migrated out of the same Indian subcontinent to travel in the opposite direction south & east till they arrived in Australia where they were isolated, left alone for 60,000 years to do whatever they liked. Their culture did not need to evolve beyond the stone age because unlike the Greeks they did not have the Persians on one side & the Romans on the other. They did not have to compete or lift their game. There were plenty of kangaroos to eat, spearing them was easy, so they did not need bows & arrows.

Luckily for the Aboriginal people the kindest, gentlest colonial power in world history was the first to arrive in the land of OZ.

Loudmouth, when aboriginal children were educated at primary schools in the Christian missions, just like white children before 1972 they could read, rite & do rithmatic. They were capable of either doing a trade apprenticeship or going to university & many did. My own family was involved in doing this, namely arranging for Aboriginal children to go to boarding school in the big smoke, tech college & uni as well as holidays on the Sunshine coast.

Now Aboriginal youth like White youth are coming out of university with a degree but are still UN-employed.

Is Mise, but investigating your family history involves researching at the state government department of births, deaths & marriages, has NOTHING to do with the federal census bureau.

Mayan, exactly.

ttbn, true.

Rhosty, simpler = truer. complicated = less true.

Geoff of Perth, exactly.

Suseonline, defending ANTI-socialism as usual.

Yuyutsu, correct.

"s Mise, but investigating your family history involves researching at the state government department of births, deaths & marriages, has NOTHING to do with the federal census bureau."

Where do you get the idea that family history is confined to NSW?
My family is in all states of the Commonwealth, Great Britain and the Continent.
Thankfully not all countries adopted the stupid Australian practice (now thankfully discontinued) of destroying census papers and in the fullness of time these will be available to researchers.

If certain politicians in the past had had their way all of the Convict Records would have been destroyed; as it was research was only by permission and with severe restrictions instead of the free access which we now enjoy.

"Is Mise, but investigating your family history involves researching at the state government department of births, deaths & marriages, has NOTHING to do with the federal census bureau."

What a narrow idea you have of research!!