Relationship in household (including grandchildren) (RLGP)

This variable describes the relationship of each person in a family to the family reference person. Where a person is not part of a family their relationship to the reference person is described.

This variable is different from the Relationship in household (RLHP) variable, as it:

• has an extra grandchild type, being ‘Dependent student grandchild’
• classifies lone grandparents (with no parent-child relationship present in the household) as ‘Lone parent’

This variable can only be used with other related grandparent/grandchild variables. These variables are:

• Child type (including grandchildren) (CTGP)
• Grandparent families (FMGF)

It cannot be used with standard family variables.

Persons present in an occupied private dwelling on Census Night

This variable is created using responses to the relationship in household, sex, age and attendance at an educational institution on the Census form.

Sex (SEXP) is used to determine whether the person is in a same-sex or opposite-sex couple.

Age (AGEP) and Student status (STUP) information is used to determine what type of child the person is:

• child under 15 (including grandchild under 15)
• dependent student (including dependent student grandchild)
• non-dependent child (including non-dependent grandchild)

This variable is similar to Relationship in household (RLHP), but there are three key differences in how Relationship in household (including grandchildren) (RLGP) is processed. The table below outlines these scenarios and how each variable classifies the person.

Persons temporarily absent on Census Night are also taken into consideration when deriving this variable. This helps with the identification of some families and for distinguishing between lone person and group households.

During data processing, families are identified and created based around a ‘family reference person’. For cases where a child or non-family member was listed as Person 1, a more appropriate person is selected to be the reference person.

This variable was first included in 2011.

No changes have been made for 2021.

Family coding processes

During Census family coding, all children under 15 years of age are allocated a nominal parent if their parent/s are not present in the household on Census Night, or if the parent/s were not reported as temporarily absent. Nominal parents can be the child's sibling, grandparent, aunt/uncle or other related individuals.

Grandparent families are recognised where a grandparent/s is allocated as the nominal parent or where there is only a grandparent-grandchild relationship present in the family and no parent child relationship. When a parent is temporarily absent from the family and their relationship to the child cannot be determined, the relationship cannot be coded. This can result in a small number of children being reported incorrectly as grandchildren when a parent is simply absent on Census Night.

RLGP may not represent caring responsibilities

Users should note that grandparent-grandchild relationships are constructed for the purposes of family coding in order to create a statistical family. It may not be representative of who provides care.

For example, a scenario could be that a 20 year old grandchild lives with her grandmother. She is a full-time student and is dependent on her grandmother. Alternatively, she may have moved in with her grandmother specifically to take care of her. It is important that users do not make assumptions about grandparent families.

This variable does not have a non-response rate as it is created during Census processing by using responses from more than one question on the Census form.

• Child type (including grandchildren) (CTGP)
• Grandparent families (FMGF)
• Relationship in Household (RLHP)

• People
• Household and families: Census