This article was updated on 6 May when the CSO responded to a request for comment.

MORE THAN A month after census night, homes in parts of county Clare have still yet to receive census forms.

The 2022 census is a count of everyone in Ireland on the night of Sunday 3 April.

On the official census website, the Central Statistics Office – which carries out the population count – says forms must be completed by that date.

However, nearly five weeks later many people in parts of east Clare are still waiting for their forms to arrive.

Councillor Pat Hayes says he’s been constantly receiving calls from constituents who are requesting forms since the weekend the count was due to take place.

“It’s a complete farce, the whole lot of it, to tell the truth,” the Fianna Fáil representative said.

The issue has been reported across a broad stretch of east Clare – from O’Callaghans Mills to Mountshannon – with particular issues in Feakle, Scarriff, Tuamgraney and Bodyke.

The Maghera based councillor said enumerators informed him that they had issues recruiting people to carry out the census.

Hayes and An Post said the issue was then compounded as forms were sent on envelopes marked with only an Eircode – not a full postal address – meaning An Post was unable to deliver them and the forms were returned. 

However, the Central Statistics Office said that both an address and an Eircode were used on the envelopes.

A courier company was subsequently engaged to help deliver all the forms and the CSO said it expects the issue to be fully resolved in the coming days.

The problem is leading to fears that the area will lose out on public services as its population will be undercounted.

“The Romans were able to do a census years ago. We had a year extra to develop this one and we still haven’t resolved it,” Hayes said.

“I think it’s absolutely disgraceful that we’re still here, a month later, and people are trying to remember what they done on April 3rd.

The sad thing about it is that some people who might’ve been accounted for have passed away.

An Post spokesperson Anna McHugh explained that Eircodes, when they are on letters or packages, are used for processing and a full postage address is needed to ensure that post is delivered.

“The Eircode is used in processing – if it’s on a letter, it’s used in processing. But when it comes to delivery, our postal staff haven’t been implanted with widgets in their brains to look at an Eircode and know what the address is,” McHugh said.

“If you’re putting something through the An Post system we need a full postal address.”

The CSO apologised to householders who have not yet received a census form.

“In one region of east Clare we had some delays and challenges in delivering census forms and we made a number of attempts to ensure forms were delivered to homes,” it said in a statement.

This included diverting enumerators from neighbouring areas to deliver forms and posting forms directly to householders. Census forms were posted using an address and Eircode and unfortunately it was only after census night that we were informed that these had not been delivered by An Post.   

“We can assure householders in east Clare that anyone returning a form to us in the next few weeks will be included in the 2022 census and the area will not be disadvantaged as a result of the delay in returning the form.  

“We are confident that an accurate record of the region in 2022 will be recorded for future generations. We would like to thank them for their commitment to the Census and for recognising the importance of participating in the census,” the CSO statement concluded.

Any householder who has not yet received their census form can reach the CSO by calling this helpline 0818 202204 or by emailing census2022@cso.ie.