asked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether the European Union has the powers to carry out a compulsory census of all people residing in the European Union; what would be the purpose of such a census; whether any consideration has been given to the questions that might be included in any such census; and whether such a proposal would have to be approved by both Houses of Parliament. [HL621]
The information requested falls within the responsibility of the National Statistician, who has been asked to reply.
Letter from the National Statistician and Registrar General, Karen Dunnell, to Lord Stoddart of Swindon, dated 10 December 2007.
As National Statistician and Registrar General for England and Wales I have been asked to reply to your recent Question asking whether the European Union has the powers to carry out a compulsory census of all people residing in the European Union; what would be the purpose of such a census; whether any consideration has been given to the questions that might be included in any such census; and whether such a proposal would have to be approved by both Houses of Parliament. (HL621).
No, the European Union has no powers to carry out a compulsory census of all residents in the European Union. The European Parliament is currently considering a Council regulation relating to the provision to the Commission of harmonised statistics by member states. Such statistics are to be derived from nationally conducted censuses of population and housing, or from alternative sources of data such as sample surveys or registers of administrative records. All such data will be subject to appropriate statistical disclosure control measures.
The Commission needs to be in possession of sufficiently reliable and comparable data on population and housing in order to fulfil the tasks assigned to it, notably by Articles 2 and 3 of the treaty establishing the European Community.
Such statistics as are provided for by the Council regulation will relate only to those topics designated as “core” in the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe's Recommendations for the 2010 Censuses of Population and Housing, and which have been endorsed by the Conference of European Statisticians. The Office for National Statistics played a prominent role in the preparation of these recommendations. The content of, and mode of access to, the statistics will be prescribed by a subsequent European Commission regulation in due course.
Neither the EU Council regulation nor the Commission regulation will require the approval of either House, but are subject to examination by Parliament through the European Scrutiny Committee. However, the content of the relevant 2011 census for England and Wales will be subject to the approval of both Houses of Parliament.