Census 2011

"In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. All went to their own towns to be registered." (Luke 2:1-3; NRSV).

In these days, the Office for National Statistics awarded the £150m Census contract to Lockheed Martin, the US arms manufacturer (think Trident, F-16s, and cluster bombs) and consultant (contract interrogators at Guantanamo Bay, and surveillance). A coalition of protestors had set up a website at www.countmeout.me.uk, urging people to boycott the Census (up to £1,000 fine and a criminal record), but interestingly at the time of writing the website could not be displayed.

Counting, data and population statistics can be very political.

The last census in the Palestinian territories was taken in December 2007, and found that the population had risen by 30% in the previous decade to 3.74 million: "In a region where demographics are used to justify contentious claims to land, especially in the West Bank and Jerusalem, the results sparked unusual agreement between Israelis and Palestinians who attacked the headcount as inaccurate." Israel's population grew by 5% over the same period to about 7 million, almost twice as big as the Palestinian population. But in the West Bank, there are two million Palestinians and 250,000 Israelis, and the representative of the Israeli settlers in the West Bank said the Palestinian figure was "grossly exaggerated" and "politically motivated". Conversely, the number of Palestinians in East Jerusalem was lower than expected, according to some Palestinians, and too high, according to some Israelis.