NZ Census scrapped as Govt moves to monthly inflation figures

The days of trying to get every New Zealander to fill out a Census form are over.

Minister of Statistics Dr Shane Reti announced today that Stats NZ will move to an admin-data-first Census.

This means using data the Government has already collected when trying to assemble datasets that include every New Zealanders.

For example, instead of asking your income on a Census form, Stats NZ could ask Inland Revenue how much you earn.

Reti also announced that from 2027, Stats NZ will deliver monthly, rather than quarterly, inflation figures.

After the 2023 Census, Stats NZ launched a consultation on the future of the census and then submitted a proposal to Cabinet.

Reti’s announcement today represents the conclusion of that process.

Reti said projections for the cost of a full enumeration Census in 2028 were heading towards $400 million – $227m had been appropriated to deliver the new approach.

Mary Craig, acting Stats NZ chief executive and government statistician said: “This is an exciting and necessary change.

“The traditional way of running a nationwide survey on Census Day can no longer be justified, due to rising costs, declining survey response rates, and disruption from events, like Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023.

“From 2030, key New Zealand Census data and statistics will be produced every year, in a cost-effective and sustainable way.”

Surveys asking Census-style questions will still happen annually and only sample a small fraction of the population.

“The new survey will be set up to be highly flexible, with opportunities to change content and topics much more frequently,” Craig said.

During the consultation on the Census last year, former Government statistician Len Cook and the Public Health Communication Centre urged that any changes to the Census be carefully considered and arguing that the scientific implications of any changes be transparent.

“There is no time over the past 50 years when the scope and quality of population statistics has been of such importance in public life in Aotearoa New Zealand as now,” said Cook.

“The regular population Census has long been the window on places, communities and families that monitors such change.

“Statistics NZ now wish to change our key window on the population dynamics that drive population change in many parts of Aotearoa New Zealand.”

Dr Bill Kaye-Blake, principal economist, New Zealand Institute of Economic Research, responded to the announcement, saying: “The decision to rely on administrative data rather than a full Census is a blow to vulnerable communities and rural Māori communities.

“The announced change says, ‘we don’t want to know’ to struggling rural Māori communities.”

Dr Jesse Whitehead, Senior Research Fellow, Te Ngira: Institute for Population Research, University of Waikato, called the announcement disappointing.

“Administrative data has its own challenges, biases, and inconsistencies, which means it is not the same quality as census data.”

She said it was not clear whether New Zealanders would be happy to trade off having to fill in a Census form every five years with having their everyday data used in this way.

It was also unclear if the agencies that would have to provide the data regularly were willing and able to do so.

Dr Gerard Sonder and Dr Debbie Ryan from Pacific Perspectives Ltd wrote in a Public Health Communication Centre Briefing, “This method falls short of Stats NZ’s accuracy benchmarks, especially for mobile and underserved groups like Pacific communities, and key issues, such as ethnicity misclassification, remain unresolved.”

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