IT MAKES NO CENSUS

Have you been “the one that forgets”? Or possibly “the one that doesn’t want to fill in a census form that has Lockheed Martin’s blood-stained finger prints smeared all over it”? Either way you’re not alone in facing down the hordes of Census Non-Compliance Officers currently combing the land for unreturned forms; at last count a whacking 10% of the 26million households sent forms are yet to return them.

Campaigns against Lockheed’s involvement in the Census have been running since the news broke of the government’s 150 million smackers deal with the death merchants. Around the time of the census there were a number protests, pickets and e-mail campaigns, but the main focus has been the issue of what to do with the form itself. Protesters split into two camps, the devil-may-care boycott and be damned folk on the one side and the wilier mess-up-yer-form and hit the bastards in the pocket while dodging a fine crew on the other.

At the moment, Lockheed’s Lackeys are in the last phase of collection, with officers who have the power to interview under caution doing the rounds. If you haven’t sent it in yet and are getting twitchy, the best advice seems to be not to answer the door to the collectors, no matter how much they huff and puff. The only prosecutions are those where there is hard evidence of refusal - hard to rustle up by shouting through a letter box. If you’re still feeling edgy, consider this: In 2001, only 38 people out of 6,100 no-returns – a mere 0.6% - were prosecuted and no one was fined more than £500 plus court costs.

*See www.countmeout.me.uk