ESO still can’t release census
(CNS): Although the National Census was finished and ready for public consumption some four months ago, the Economics and Statistics Office (ESO) has said it cannot release the document to the public until the premier presents it to the Legislative Assembly. The ESO confirmed that the full and completed report was handed to Cabinet in December but as a result of the procedure which requires its presentation in the LA the document still remains under wraps. The Legislative Assembly has not met since early December and despite indications that there are plans to meet early next month, there has been no confirmation about when the country’s parliament will sit and when the report will be released.
The ESO had worked hard to produce the latest national count as quickly as possible but the document languishes in limbo. Although it was scheduled to be produced during the last sitting of the parliament on 14 December, the premier did not table the report.
The national project started on 10 October 2010 and took around two months to survey 30,000 homes. The resutling document, which cost the taxpayer over $1.1 million, includes myriad information about the country that will assist decision makers in both the public and private realms. But so far, only a limited amount of information from the national count has been released.
The preliminary figures released revealed that the current population of the Cayman Islands is 54,878 living in residential houses plus a further 481 people living in institutions such as prisons, dorms or retirement homes.
George Town is the country’s most populated district, accounting for the majority of the entire population with 27,704 people. 11,269 people now live in West Bay and 10,341 people in Bodden Town, the fast growing district.
At a reception at the end of last year for those involved in the count, the governor revealed that there were 135 different nationalities living in Cayman at the time of the census, and the full report would be critical to developing good policy. “The data collected by the exemplary census, which was carried out very professionally, will be viewed in detail soon,” Duncan Taylor had stated more than three months ago.
Maria Zingapan, the ESO director, added that she hoped the details, once released, would be used to inform decision-making in the public and private sectors, making the data relevant to everyday life in the Cayman Islands.
Category: Politics
The books are beeing "cooked".
There were massive problems experienced by enumerators with up to 10% of respondees. Did they have something to hide or what it was about I have no idea. This is like the poverty report of years ago it never seemed to come out anbd when it did it made no sense.
Mac has WAY more important things to do like:
Travelling first class
Paving private parking lots
Saving Private (Mike) Ryan
Travelling first class with Foolio
Pretending he never heard of Stan Thomas
Travelling first class
Lying about losses due to lawsuits
Travelling first class.
That's why this man should be impeached. He is an absolute id 10 t and the people of Cayman are almost as bad in letting him continue to abuse and take advantage of whatever he dam n well pleases regardless of cost to yourselves, the islands, your reputations and credibility.
Mac: Too many people wrote in 'Jedi' in answer to the religion question Ju-Ju, wha we goin do?
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Yup. And given dat money to dem chuch. You know, the last time govt. and chuch got this entangled a certain radical got crucified. Think Jesus would be proud of forcing money from people and giving it to private religious clubs?
the la has not met in nearly 4 months?????….wtf is going on?
Actually the memo says that only news which supports the re-election of the current government is to be released until after May 2013.
Surely stale data would be the point – were it not too much to imagine that our leader is capable of creating a strategy. Stale data allow for a claim that the bad news in the data is out of date and that things are really wonderful now.
This process of tabling it in the LA is stupid.
This is a classic example of the lack of transparency in Cayman and the waste of public monies, caused by the unnecessary delay in the publication of information. The value of ESO statistics declines daily as the data becomes old and stale. This is not the fault of the ESO; it is the fault of the political process. This needs to change.
Tim Ridley
Good luck with that. More like a classic example of Caymankind. Bringing Caymanian leadership up to developed country standards and above third world status will take more time then the current generation has left in this world. The hope has to be for the far future. Their are too many third world minds in the pot to fight in the present.
Can you please explain your use of "Caymankind". I hope I am wrong but you appear to use it in a way that is derogatory to Caymanians and Cayman.
Caymankind: The "kind" of thing that is expected to happen now in Grand Cayman and not in other countries.
This is unacceptable. Looks like we need another referendum; this time to force the UDP government to do their job. Oh, I forgot, May 2013 soooooon come! Wish it was tomorrow.
At this stage one can only speculate this report is deliberately being withheld because it reveals information the UDP government doesn't want the public to learn. Personally, I think this report will show that non-Caymanians officially outnumber Caymanians on our islands and that is news no government wants to deliver before an election.
incompetence of the cig and civil service never ends…..
has the government ever done anything on time?
Actually the refusal to release the report is purely political.
If they would just let the Premier's Office decide on and write the content of the Census report it could have been released long ago. The way it is we have had to pay a lot of people to collect information and now someone needs to figure out how to spin it.
Not met since early December and not scheduled to meet again until May?!? Please tell me that this schedule is not tied to our tax payers dollars! How the heck can anything get done with this work schedule? My business would be shut down if the decision makers had this much time off.
LA off for five months? How can this be the norm for running a country?!?
Be careful what you wish for. As Mark Twain once said, “No man’s life, liberty, or property are safe when the legislature is in session”.
If you look at the amount of damage they can do in a few short meetings, then we are probably lucky that the don't meet more often.
The UDP does not want this released for the following reasons:
1. The standard of living has fallen and the results clearly show their poor economic management.
2. They cannot justify adding another seat to West Bay from the results.
3. The answers reflect how their previous policies and actions have negatively impacted our way of life! eg. The Status Grants have increased the burden on Social Services because we gave status to so many people without considering that their families etc would be migrating to Cayman and a lot of the status recipients did not have financial means to support them selves. Being poor should not disqualify you from getting status, but if we were going to give away status why not ensure that the recipients could have at least been self sufficient?
Mac is afraid of this in the same way he is afraidof One MAn One Vote, it is clear he is running scared now.
Once again Mac is hiding the truth from the people. How long will we put up with this?
You tell me. How long? Well?