Senator BOURNE (7:36 PM) —It is with a great deal of pleasure that I rise tonight to speak on the Census Information Legislation Amendment Bill 2000. It is one that the Democrats, and my office in particular, have been very interested in for a long time. As we have heard, the bill will allow name-identified information from the 2001 census to be preserved by the National Archives of Australia so that it can be released for future genealogical and other research after that closed access period of 99 years.

It is very fitting that, in the year of the Centenary of Federation, this treasure trove of information about Australia and Australians and our way of life will be kept. These will be the first census forms to have been kept for future research purposes since the Australian census began in 1911. For more than 20 years, genealogists have been asking successive Australian governments to keep the census forms. The Democrats joined what was known as the `Save the Census' campaign in August 1994. Historians, scientists, medical practitioners and even the genealogical community in Ireland have joined the campaign over the years. In 1995 the advisory council of the Australian Archives recommended that census material be retained permanently. Then, in May 1998, the House of Representatives Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee looked at all the issues in great detail and they also unanimously recommended that the census forms be saved.

The Census Working Group of the Australasian Federation of Family History Organisations calls this bill a `giant leap forward' for the future of family history and also for medical studies in Australia, and it is. Also very welcome is the government's proposal to fund an extensive public education campaign leading up to census night. One thing that I would like to ask the minister to consider is this: if there should be a difference of opinion about retention between people within a particular household, could a separate census form be made available on request, much as a privacy envelope request can be made, so that different individuals' views can be expressed? I am hoping that this wonderful opportunity for a positive response to opt in and to keep our census forms will show once and for all that we are not frightened of our history or of our future. Perhaps it will also lead to ensuring that the destruction of this valuable resource will become a thing of the past.