Sir, – Denis O'Donoghue (March 30th) makes an excellent point when he highlights that the census simply asks "Can you speak Irish?", unlike its more qualitative UK equivalent, which asks how well respondents can speak various languages, with grades from "very well" to "not at all".
Would the census address some of the criticism of the religion question if a similar scale were included?
This would allow us to appreciate if people were answering the question on the basis of having been raised in a religion but no longer practising it. This would be of considerable use for the planning of services, such as schools, which after all is a key stated intention of the census. – Yours, etc,
ANDREW DOYLE,
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Bandon, Co Cork.