After reading many articles and considering many possible courses of action, from complying with this absurd invasion of privacy, to lying on the form, to boycotting like Senator Nick Xenophon, and a range of other options designed to protect my privacy and hopefully avoid the drama and expense of being ‘punished’ for not trusting the government with every intimate detail of my life, I’ve finally reached a conclusion.

After reading this excellent article written by a former Deputy Privacy Commissioner, it all came into sharp focus for me.

1: I will not be filling out the Census. Not online, not via physical forms. This is the least-bad way for me to preserve the integrity and intent of the Census, for quality statistical data, without compromising my and my families privacy.

2: I will not be filling out the form with false information. It is not my intention to sabotage the Census or damage the integrity of the data collected, only to protect myself and those in my care from the prying eyes of bureaucrat busybodies both today and in the future, who may choose to access that data for who-knows-what purposes.

3: If I am ordered to fill out the Census, then I will fill it out with bogus information. And I won’t be shy about it. If they chose to throw the maximum fine of $1,800 at me for lying on the form then so be it, I’ll fight it out with them then.

The beauty of this approach is that there’s every chance they won’t try and fine me (as they love to point out, they’ve never actually fined anyone in the past), and the ‘$180 per day’ doesn’t start accruing until they send me an ‘order’, which is unlikely to happen. If they DO send me an ‘order’ to complete the Census, then I’ll complete their damn Census… I’ll answer every question so completely it’ll set their heads spinning… And none of it will be true.

But by answering (fake or otherwise) it will ‘stop the clock’ on the $180 per day fine, and cap my financial exposure to $1,800 + X days worth of the $180 per day fine depending on how long it takes to get around to filling out their damn form with all my bogus information after they issue the order. So call it $2,500 give or take, if they choose to chase me.

Sure, that adds up to a lot of money, money which I’d much rather spend on my family, my home, my car, my next holiday, or some other thing far more useful than paying ‘protection money’ to get the bureaucrats off my back, but I’m not handing over that kind of all-encompassing information about myself and my loved ones to complete strangers. I don’t care who their employer is, or what badge they carry. No one needs to know everything about me or my family, and I don’t trust anyone who would want to know so much.

I take the exact opposite view to the bed-wetters at the Sydney Morning Herald, who proudly proclaim that they’ll be bullied into complying with bad laws because the Census is ‘too important’. If the Census is truly so important, then that’s all the more reason to stand firm on the privacy aspects, so as to preserve the integrity of the data collected. And if it’s not important enough to be worth preserving its integrity via strong privacy protections, then it’s not important enough to hand over my personal information for.

As I’ve said on this blog time and time again, these sorts of invasions of privacy, the ongoing closing of the web of rules and regulations and intrusions into our lives, will never stop until we say no, and dig our heels in!

So that’s what I’m doing. This is my political protest, my civil disobedience. Consider my heels well and truly ‘dug in’.

There will be no Census form with my name on it.

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