Census 2021: Important information for students in the UK

24th March 2021

If you are studying in Wales for 3+ months, and have been in the UK on Sunday March 21st, it’s your legal obligation to complete the Census. It can be done online and it takes around 10-15 minutes to complete.

Census Day was Sunday 21 March, but it’s not too late to take part. You must complete the census by law or you could be fined up to £1,000. Some questions are labelled as voluntary, so it is not an offence if you do not answer these.

What’s the Census 2021 for?

The information collected in the Census is used to help the government plan and decide how to spend money on things like:

• transport
• health and social care (NHS)
• education
• housing
• crime
• jobs and businesses
• environment
• family
• local community
• poverty

How is my information protected in the National Census 2021?

• Statistics from the census are completely anonymous.
• Personal information will not be published.
• Your census record is kept secure for 100 years.
• There are strict security measures to make sure all information is protected.

What are the Census 2021 questions about?

Questions are NOT about opinions, likes and dislikes, etc. Instead, Census questions aim to collect factual information that can help the government build a clear picture of who lives where and to have an overview of society at this time. This is used to understand what kind of services are needed in different areas.

Census questions are about:

• Number of people living in the area
• Age
• Sex
• Family or household members
• Employment
• Education
• Ethnicity and nationality
• Religion
• How people travel and commute
• Languages spoken

If you misplaced or binned your Census letter, you can easily request a new code online here:

https://census.gov.uk/help/get-an-access-code-or-paper-census

If you haven’t completed the Census already, you can do it here:

https://census.gov.uk/