Greetings Readers, and Members of Parliament
VICTORY!!!
On Tuesday 28 June 2005, at 11:00 am Eastern Time, Member of Parliament Dominic LeBlanc, Deputy Government Whip, rose and stated words to the effect that "If the Speaker would seek it, I believe he would have the unanimous consent of the House to deem Bill S-18 -- An Act to amend the Statistics Act, to have passed Third Reading" (not necessarily an exact quote). That consent was given.
Bill S-18 has now passed all necessary stages in both the Senate and the House of Commons. All that remains to be done to make it law is for it to receive Royal Assent. It is expected this will be received shortly.
Today there is cause for a great deal of cheering and celebrating. As I write this I imagine I can hear that cheering taking place from Coast to Coast to Coast in Canada, and other countries where descendents of Canadian ancestors have been seeking access to our Census records.
It is believed that the Library and Archives of Canada has already scanned images of the 1911 National Census of Canada and they should be available on line almost immediately. We should now be able to spend our Summer researching the 1911 records instead of continuing the fight to see them released.
Genealogists and historians owe a GREAT debt of thanks to the perseverance and dedication of the Hon. Senator Lorna Milne, without whose support over the past several years, we would have been unable to achieve this victory.
Those wishing to express their thanks to Senator Milne can do so through her Policy Advisor, Jeff Paul at
PAULJ@SEN.PARL.GC.CA
On behalf of myself, Muriel M. Davidson -- my Co-chair of the Canada Census Committee, and all members of the committee, I wish to express our thanks to all who have written letters and email, signed petitions, called their Parliamentary representatives, and who have generally supported our efforts to regain the public access to Historic Census records we believed we were always entitled to.
We look forward to hearing some of the stories of your success in researching the 1911 Census records.
Until next time. Happy Hunting.
Gordon A. Watts gordon_watts@telus.net
Post 1901 Census Project Web Site: http://globalgenealogy.com/Census
en français http://globalgenealogy.com/Census/Index_f.htm
This is wonderful news,
and I hope this will help my fellow reseachers who have descendants in Canada