Canada. Demographic Review Secretariat : On 26 May 1986, following the results of an earlier review of immigration levels in Canada which showed the changing nature of the Canadian population, the Hon. Jake Epp, Minister of National Health and Welfare, announced the creation of a three-year project entitled the Review of Demography and its Implications for Economic and Social Policy. The Review was to report to Cabinet by 31 March 1989, on "possible changes in the size, structure and distribution of the population of Canada to 2025, and how they might affect Canada's social and economic life." The aim was to place demographic change within a proper social and economic context so that its results could be used in decision making processes throughout various levels of government. The Review's work began on 2 June 1986, with a staff of five.
The Review's four main activities were: 1) the definition of questions to be addressed, based on the existing professional expertise of academic and government social scientists working in the field of population studies; 2) specifying and soliciting any required supplementary scientific information; 3) evaluating the empirical evidence received for their impact on federal government programmes; and 4) drafting reports to Cabinet. The Review did not do the extensive social science research, but worked closely with the academic community, receiving papers and project proposals. These were then evaluated on the basis of their potential contribution to the field and the amount of grant funding available. Researchers were strongly encouraged to submit their Review projects to the appropriate social scientific journals to ensure the dissemination of the information in a published form, and many were.
The Review also worked closely with other agencies of the federal government, particularly Employment and Immigration (which set up its own research unit to assist the Review), and Statistics Canada (which made arrangements to coordinate researcher access to its data, particularly the 1981 and 1986 census figures), and with provincial governments. The Minister and the Review also encouraged national business groups, and labour and ethno-cultural organizations to make their views on demography and its implications known to the Review. In addition to these activities, the Review Secretariat, in collaboration with the University of Chicago, developed a training course designed to assist senior officials from many Francophone African nations to use the new technology of personal computers to analyse and disseminate the demographic data that they collected.
The first phase of the Review, that of defining the research study questions, was completed in March 1987 with the acceptance of proposal for research in five major areas: changing household and family structure; population growth and economic growth; migration and regional development; Canada's changing society; and international population movement. A 1987 published report, Posing the Questions, listed those projects to be completed during Phase II. The report based on the findings of the research, Charting Canada's Future, was released on 12 December 1989.
In January 1991, the Review, newly renamed the Demographic Review Secretariat (DRS), became part of the Policy, Planning and Information Branch. Its mandate was reviewed, and it was then instructed to begin more detailed research on the social and economic effects of changing family patterns, one of the five areas identified in Phase I of the original Review. The DRS accepted 35 research proposals in seven categories, all relating to the changes in Canadian family life.
As a result of the February 1992 federal budget, the Demographic Review Secretariat was ordered to cease operations. On 15 July 1992, the Secretariat staff became members of the Social Statistics Development Project, Social, Institutions and Labour Statistics Field at Statistics Canada for a period of two years.
