Rights group calls for census revolt

Human rights group Scotland Against Criminalising Communities (SACC) urged people to protest against CACI UK's involvement in the census and to push the Scottish government to cut ties with the firm.

The company is a wholly owned subsidiary of US-based defence contractor CACI International and is currently facing two lawsuits brought by over 250 Iraqi torture victims in that country.

The action concerns its role in supplying interrogators to Abu Ghraib prison at the height of the period when detainees were allegedly being severely tortured.

SACC said the cost of cancelling the contract and postponing the census could be met if the government sought compensation from CACI which it said had provided misleading information about the progress of the Abu Ghraib lawsuits.

Chairman Richard Haley said: "CACI has publicly denied any wrongdoing but it has not so far responded in court to the substantive allegations.

"Instead, it is trying to claim that it is immune from legal action because it was working for the US government.

"CACI is trying to avoid being held to account for its actions at the same time as it is trying to use the Scottish census to launder its reputation."

The victims are seeking compensation for acts including rape, being forced to watch a family member being tortured and abused to death, repeated beatings, forced nudity, hooding, being detained in isolation, being urinated on and otherwise humiliated and being prevented from praying.

The Scottish government handed CACI an £18.5 million contract in 2008 to provide services for the Scottish census.

Mr Haley said if the government refused to cancel the contract, researchers should boycott the data and the Scottish public should "use census day to say No to this dirty business."

People who fail to complete and return their census forms face fines of up to £1,000 but in the last census just three people were prosecuted out of the 200,000 estimated to have been missed from the survey.