According to 1921cenus.og webpage the government seems to be firmly sticking to the 100 year rule with a possible reason being that for the 2021 census there would have to be strong promises of confidentially which wouldn't sit well with the early release of the 1921 census when the promise was made at the time that individuals details would never be made public
So possibly people filling in the census were under the impression it wouldn't be released
Please note all my remarks are about the 1921 census for England & Wales as the Scottish 1921 contained an additional question and comes under different legislation.
Rather than go to a third party site like 1921census.org which though a good site does contain inaccuracies try. This contains various links to census material.
http://www.rootschat.com/links/01l25/Or to see a blank 1921 census schedule.
http://www.rootschat.com/links/01l26/As I have mentioned before there was no assurance of confidentiality for either the lifetime of those who appear on the census or for 100 years (the 100 year rule did not come into existence until 1966 approx. 45 years after the census was taken) or that it would never be released.
The census did state STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL on the face of the schedule but the earlier census also contained such wording and were released on average 80 years after they were taken (i.e. within the lifetime of many who appeared on them) so the expectation was the census would be released in their lifetime.
To say anything else is to distort history.
It was also possible for anyone who wished to keep their information confidential the opportunity to make a sealed confidential return (I don’t have details of how many took up that option but it would be possible to find out).
In the case of these their schedules could be redacted for 100 years if thought appropriate.
However what confidence would the public have in Government who publish a consultation paper claiming that in future all government documents will be open and available with only sensitive information redacted pass a law in 2000 entitled the Freedom of Information Act-
(
http://www.rootschat.com/links/01l27/ )
-which as its first clause enshrines into law-
(“1 General right of access to information held by public authorities.
(1)Any person making a request for information to a public authority is entitled—
(a)to be informed in writing by the public authority whether it holds information of the description specified in the request, and
(b)if that is the case, to have that information communicated to him.”)
-then refuses to honour that undertaking?
It is far more important that the current crop of MPs honour the current undertakings set in law rather than the ambiguous statements written on a census form almost 100 years ago that could be argued were aimed at the officials handling the schedules rather than the public.
Cheers
Guy
