Those who don't declare as male or female in census to be assigned random biological sex

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People who don't declare themselves as male or female in this year's census will be randomly assigned a gender.

The survey on April 3rd will ask respondents about their biological sex rather than their gender identity.

The Central Statistics Office says it's aware it's a "sensitive issue" for some people.

But it's told the Irish Times EU legislation means the only options for questions about biological sex are male and female.

The CSO website says:

“For statistical analysis purposes all entries will be assigned a sex. Where this is not clearly indicated on a census form it will be assigned at random.”

They say the CSO “recognises the importance of accounting for gender identity as distinct from sex” and that work is underway to introduce a question based on gender identity for the next census.