Greetings All. I have participated in a focus group on another subject through another company and the "focus group" itself consisted of 12 people. Considering that Pamela White informed me there were six focus groups, 4 in English and two in French, that totals 72 people involved in the "focus groups". The purpose of the focus groups was to test the wording of questions to be included in a subsequent survey. It is my understanding that 2000 people were polled at random for that survey. There were three times that number of signatures on our main petition presented to the House of Commons, and untold thousands of signatures on numerous other petitions presented to both the House and the Senate. As Wayne quoted part of the National Post article referring to the "promise" it seems clear to me that information garnered from the focus groups is tainted -- that the questions were worded in such a way as to obtain a pre-ordained response. If the goal of the questions were to find out the true feelings regarding access to Historic Census records, the question of the non-existent promise would never have been brought up. Pamela White, in a previous email to me indicated she expected the survey to be posted on the StatCan website. As of today it is not there. I have sent another email asking it this morning. The article in the Vancouver Sun was somewhat smaller than that in the National Post, simply reporting the announced results without any editorial elaboration. It is to be hoped that we will have a groundswell of letters to the editor denouncing the results of this survey. I look forward to seeing some of your letters posted to this list. I will be writing my own letter but do not let that stop you from writing your own. Wayne mentioned my submission "The Myths of Census". Feel free to direct anyone you are writing to to locations where it may be viewed, i.e. Wayne's website or the Post 1901 Census Project website. Feel free also to direct interested parties directly to myself. We have not lost this campaign yet. The only way we can lose it is if we give up. If we do not succeed on this round, we will continue to fight the next. We must continue to write our letters and gather signatures on our petitions. The MPs have taken a vacation from the House but we have to keep at them. Gordon ----- Original Message ----- From: Wayne Cook <wtcook@idirect.com> To: <CANADA-CENSUS-CAMPAIGN-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Tuesday, 20 June, 2000 4:21 PM Subject: Re: [CCC-L] Keep Census Date Secret - Public Tells Ottawa Hi, "In some of the focus group sessions, as soon as the notion of 'breaking a promise' emerged, the idea was seized upon by other participants who then expressed their opposition to release. Keeping these data as confidential came to be seen as the 'right' or moral thing to do." There is that promise again sticking out its ugly head! That is a very disturbing article as a rebutal they should print Gordon Watts' "Myth of Census". I think the Liberals (I use that word loosely) have their annual 2 day meeting this week. I think with an election call next year and the fact that the 2001 census will be sent out then, this is starting to become a Hot Potato. All I know as a Canadian the focus group didn't ask me. Did they ask you? Wayne Cook http://www.waynecook.com (A History Television Approved Site) and your Host for the Simcoe County Genweb page at http://www.waynecook.com/simcoe.shtml Wasaga Beach, Ontario, Canada 1. Historic Plaques of Ontario 557 Plaques online, part of the Historic Plaques of the World Project, Provincial & State Hosts neededl 2. The Canadian Query Boards at http://www.waynecook.com/bulletin.html