Greetings All. This afternoon I mailed another batch of Census Petitions for the House of Commons to MP Murray Calder. There were a total of 1502 signatures in this batch. To date we have sent a total of 13,237 signatures. The breakdown of the petitions is as follows: Province Previous Current Total =============================== BC 1944 524 2468 AB 5311 69 5380 SK 676 33 709 MB 261 22 283 ON 1769 528 2297 PQ 548 133 681 NB 392 109 501 NS 520 84 604 PE 99 0 99 NF 208 0 208 YT 7 0 7 NT 0 0 0 NUN 0 0 0 =============================== Totals 11735 1502 13237 I am pleased that numbers of signatures from Ontario and Quebec are starting to move up. A number of petitions have been received from different branches of the OGS and from different genealogy and historical associations in Quebec. However, as can be seen from the chart, signatures from some other areas are sadly lacking. It is important to continue sending letters and email to our elected officials seeking support for public access to Historic Census records. It is equally important, if not more so, to gather signatures on the petitions. We have no means of determining numbers of letters and email written, but when petitions are sent to us for forwarding to MP Murray Calder and Senator Milne, we are able to keep a running total of signatures. This is important for demonstrating the support for our efforts to regain access to the records. The Canada Census Committee does not have a monopoly on petitions, and we are aware of some of our petitions that have been sent directly to MPs and Senators. We would request of anyone doing so to please let us know how many signatures were sent, and to whom they were sent. We would prefer to have our petitions funneled through us. If you send any petitions to other MPs or Senators, obtain a committment from them in advance that they will, in fact, present them to their respective Houses. There is no rule that states that a member must present petitions that they receive. We do have that committment from MP Murray Calder and Senator Lorna Milne. I check Hansard regularly for debates of the House of Commons and the Senate. In the Senate I have seen where one petition was presented by a Senator other than Lorna Milne, and one petition presented by Senator Milne that was different than ours, and was sent directly to her. In this instance it was 305 signatures of Canadian Home Children also seeking access to census records. In the House of Commons I have never seen a petition presented by any MP other than Murray Calder, even though I am aware of a few that have been sent to other MPs. We have no idea what happened to those petitions. Keep collecting signatures on petitions, and keep writing your letters and email. We need them both. Happy Hunting. Gordon A. Watts gordon_watts@telus.net Co-Chair, Canada Census Committee Port Coquitlam, BC http://globalgenealogy.com/Census en français http://globalgenealogy.com/Census/Index_f.htm Permission to forward without notice is granted.