Greetings All FYI Gordon ========================== Hon. John Manley Minister of Industry Sir. Prime Minister Jean Chretien was quoted in the Halifax Herald of 27 September 2000 as follows: "Mr. Chretien told delegates to the Liberal biennial convention that he would "fix the problem with UI" to give the party a better chance of winning more seats in the Atlantic region. " The article indicated that possible changes to EI/UI legislation would affect about 600,000 seasonal workers. I would point out to you, as has been done many times before, that there are an estimated 7.5 Million citizens of Canada that seek to find their ancestry, and their heritage in Canada. Many thousands of those citizens have actively campaigned, by writing letters and email to MPs and Ministers, and signing petitions, to see Historic Census restored to it's former situation where it was released to the public after a reasonable period. In case it had not occurred to you, the vast majority of those 7.5 million Canadian genealogists, from all parts of the country, are VOTERS as well. I suspect many of them have voted LIBERAL in the past. Will they do so in the future? Interim Privacy Commissioner George Radwanski was recently reported in an article in the Ottawa Citizen as saying that the Report of the Expert Panel on Access to Historic Census advised allowing Public access to Historic Census records. Mr. Manley, you have been sitting on the Report of the Expert Panel since 30 June 2000, a period now almost three months. It is time now to release that Report to the Public, either with, or without comment. Or do you intend to have it leaked little by little over an extended period of time? What are you waiting for? On behalf of the many Canadians citizens actively seeking their ancestry I call on you to do the following: Immediately release to the Public the Report of the Expert Panel on Access to Historic Census; and Accept Liberal MP Murray Calder's Bill C-484 as a Government Bill. See it processed and passed prior to an election being called. You are no doubt aware that Bill C-484 is word for word identical to Liberal Senator Lorna Milne's Bill S-15 which has received second reading and has been sent to committee. Mr. Manley, this is an issue that has been discussed for the past thirty years. Other studies have been done that also recommended allowing access to Historic Census on a basis similar to what was done with Census records up to 1901. Prior reports have made recommendations for allowing public access after somewhat shorter periods of time than the 92 years currently allowed by Regulations attached to the Privacy Act. Mr. Manley, thirty years of discussion is enough! The time to act on this matter is NOW!! Please do so. Thank you. Gordon A. WATTS gordon_watts@telus.net Canada Census Committee