In fact households received instructions for responding online, and two options — going to a website or phoning an 0800 number — to request the papers in physical form.
The writer went to the website, but, reluctant to waste any more time than he already had, gave up. Every option led to opening and completing the census, which wasn't the point of going to the site. The 0800 number was better. Following the prompts should result in the papers arriving any day now.
The point is that many people won't be bothered asking for them. Offering a website is pointless for those who do not have access to a computer, and many of those who aren't especially motivated to take part won't bother phoning the 0800 number, even if they have a phone.
A story on 1News on Friday night painted an even grimmer picture. Helen Castles not only found people in Moerewa, a community that really, really needs to take part in the census, who not only had no intention of doing so but didn't know what she was talking about. This, Statistics NZ, is the real world.
This badly misplaced faith in modern technology will inevitably cost Northland millions in government funding. Northland DHB CEO Nick Chamberlain is painfully aware of that, as those who made the decision to conduct the census in this manner should be.
Dr Chamberlain has long been complaining that the 2013 census was grossly inaccurate as far as this region was concerned. So inaccurate that he reckons it has cost the DHB $29.5 million to which it was entitled on a population basis over the last three years.
Part of that will no doubt be the result of a fast-growing population since 2013, but Dr Chamberlain believes the head count five years ago was woefully inaccurate. His problem continues — he's expecting a DHB funding shortfall of $8.4m this year — and will not be corrected by the 2018 census. In fact it may become worse.
There is absolutely no doubt that the participation rate this year will be lower than it was in 2013, and that is going to penalise not only the DHB. It will have an impact on how many police officers and school teachers Northland is entitled to. It will have an impact on almost every area of government funding. And Northland, and similar regions, will be proportionately more disadvantaged than those where participation rates are higher.
The very people who need the most help aren't going to get it because of a fundamental failure on the part of a bunch of bureaucrats to understand how difficult many people are to reach.
We're not just talking about the national level of computer literacy or access to a computer. In many cases we're talking about literacy, the ability to take part in a census by any means. (When Tomorrow's Schools was launched in 1987 the Ministry of Education was told at a meeting in Kaitaia that some Far North school committees gave the treasurer's job to the solitary member who was literate. Has anything changed since then?
Probably not. Yet here we have people in Wellington who, 30 years on, still have no idea of the barriers that stand in the way of participation in any 21st century process).
The census forms need to be physically put into the hands of many people, and explained. If necessary, they will need to be helped to fill them out. That will be time-consuming, cumbersome and expensive, but it is the only way of ensuring that the results have any meaning at all.
It must have occurred to these people in Wellington that the five-yearly head count, which is absolutely vital to the fair distribution of government spending in so many fields, is already dubious given that it is effectively voluntary, and even more so now.
Some people are very committed to contributing, but others are not. And it isn't only the poor, the uneducated, those who don't know what a census is and couldn't care less, who won't be taking part.
Five years ago the writer discovered that many educated, intelligent people with responsible jobs, most of them employed by the Government, didn't fill out their forms because they could not be bothered, or they suspected that they were designed to extract information that they did not wish to share with the Government.
Some of those people worked for the Northland DHB. You would think they would have known better than anyone that an accurate count of Northland's population was vital if the region's public health services were to be fairly funded. Surprisingly, that didn't seem to have occurred to them. And when it was explained to them they still didn't care.
Whether they will be counted this time is anyone's guess. They should be aware of Dr Chamberlain's views, but who knows? If they don't take part they won't be alone.
Police officers, in the writer's experience, tend to be very reluctant voters when it comes to electing a government, and it would not be a surprise if they weren't fussed about filling in census forms either, although again it is very much in their personal and professional interests to do so.
There are other signs that this census is poorly organised. Those who are contracted to deliver the instructions for taking part are permitted to talk to the media, but enough of them have grumbled within earshot of the writer to suggest that this exercise does not represent the finest example of government department organising and planning.
Several last week seemed to be on the verge of telling Statistics to shove their job. Grossly over-estimating the level of computer literacy in this country might prove to be the least of the department's problems.
Perhaps we should not be surprised by what we are seeing, but great injustices are about to be done. And those who will be misled by the results will include the politicians who are hoping for an accurate picture of the national housing problem. Those who are living in substandard homes are among those least likely to be counted, so we will remain none the wiser regarding that particular issue, and no doubt many others.
The ancient Romans did better than this.
