Records of the General Register Office, Government Social Survey Department, and...

The earliest form of registration was the system of parochial and diocesan registration of baptisms, burials and marriages introduced in England and Wales in 1538. It was confined to the parochial organisation of the established church and did not normally extend to extra-parochial areas, royal and private chapels, foreign churches, and catholic or nonconformists churches. Moreover, until 1754 marriage was a common law contract not necessarily requiring a church ceremony.Hardwicke's Marriage Act 1753 regularised the performance of marriages by instituting a virtual monopoly for the established church; only Quakers, Jews and the foreign churches were exempted. Churches outside the framework of the established church frequently kept their own registers, and there were certain provisions for central registration for some denominations. These arrangements and the disabilities suffered by nonconformists led in 1833 to the appointment of a select committee of the House of Commons.

General Register Office (GRO)

The GRO was established under the Births and Deaths Registration Act 1836 which, with the Marriage Act 1836, introduced a system of state registration of births, deaths and marriages in England and Wales under the direction of a Registrar General responsible to the Home Secretary. Registration of births and deaths was not made compulsory until 1874, when the Births and Deaths Registration Act transferred the obligation to register births and deaths from the registrar to the person responsible. The country was divided into registration districts, based upon the newly formed poor law districts.

The Marriage Act 1836 provided for civil marriage by superintendent registrars as an alternative to marriage by banns or licence in the established church or by the ceremonies of the Quaker, Jewish or foreign protestant congregations. Provision was also made for the solemnisation of marriages at registered places of worship of other religious denominations in the presence of a registrar and two witnesses. The Marriage Act 1898 enabled ministers of other denominations to become 'Authorised Persons' to register marriages in the same way as clergy of the established church without the attendance of a registrar.

During the First World War the Registrar General was the central registration authority for the system of national registration introduced in 1915, acting under the direction of the Local Government Board. The Registrar General was also charged with the maintenance of a register of adoptions under the Adoption of Children Act 1926 and a register of stillbirths from 1927, and with the re-registration of births of legitimated persons under the Legitimacy Act 1926. During the Second World War the office was again charged with duties in connection with national registration, and the National Register used as a basis for the National Health Service Central Register after 1952.

From 1837 to 1871 the GRO was responsible to the Home Office, though it also worked in close association with the Poor Law Commission and Board. It was transferred to the charge of the Local Government Board in 1871, the Ministry of Health in 1919 and the Department of Health and Social Security in 1968. In May 1970 the office became part of the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys (OPCS). In 1996 the OPCS, and therefore the GRO, became part of the newly created Office for National Statistics. On 1 April 2008, the GRO became a subsidiary of the Identity and Passport Service (IPS).

Government Social Survey Department and predecessors

In April 1940 a Wartime Social Survey was established by the Ministry of Information, initially working under the auspices of the National Institute of Economic and Social Research but from 1941 directly under the Ministry. The unit was used to conduct surveys into social and economic questions, particularly public attitudes to war measures and public morale, in association with the Home Intelligence Division of that department and on behalf of other government departments. Special series of surveys, such as, studies for the Economic Information Unit of the Treasury, consumer including household budget and family expenditure surveys for the Central Statistical Office and the Ministry of Labour and National Service and its successors, and national food surveys for the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries. In 1967 it became a separate department known as the Government Social Survey Department, responsible to Treasury ministers. On 11 May 1970 the department was merged with the GRO to become the Social Survey Division of the new Office of Population Censuses and Surveys.

Office of Population Censuses and Surveys

The office was formed in 1970 and was succeeded by the Office for National Statistics in 1996, responsible for the census, registration of births, deaths and marriages and the regulation of civil marriages, and the publication and analysis of medical and demographic statistics. It also conducted research into attitudes and circumstances of the general public and of particular groups on behalf of government departments, royal commissions etc. It provided the secretariat of the Parliamentary Boundary Commissions for England and Wales, and was responsible for the General Household Survey from 1970. The law relating to the registration of births, deaths and marriages has been much supplemented and amended since 1836. It is now governed by the Marriage Act 1949, the Births and Deaths Registration Act 1953 and the Registration Service Act 1953.

Censuses of Population

Decennial censuses of population were first instituted in England and Wales in 1801. The first four censuses were carried out by parish overseers and the returns digested by a clerk of the House of Commons. The establishment of the General Register Office and the registration service led to the transfer of responsibility for the census to the Registrar General under the Population Act of 1840.

In 1841 and 1851 the census of Great Britain was supervised by a Census Commission headed by the Registrar General. When the Registrar General became responsible for taking the census of 1841, England and Wales were already divided into sub-districts within registration districts, and for the purpose of the census, each was further sub-divided into appropriate enumeration districts.

In Scotland the Sheriff Substitute of each county appointed the official schoolmaster of the parish or other fit person to superintend the enumeration, each parish being generally divided into enumeration districts. After the introduction in 1855 of civil registration the organisation of the 1861 censuses were conducted in Scotland by the Registrar General for Scotland, who continued to be responsible for the Scottish section of the Great Britain census from 1901.

The census has been a decennial occurrence with the exception of 1941. Arrangements were already in hand for a census when war was declared and were adapted for an enumeration of the population which took place on 29 September 1939 primarily to provide identity cards. In 1966 the first quinquennial census was taken; it covered ten per cent of the population and was thus the first census taken purely on a sample basis.

In 1971 there was an increase on the questionnaire and a full census was taken with respect to all the questions, but tables for a number of topics were compiled from a ten per cent sample of the data selected by computer. The 1981 census was organised along the same lines as the 1971 operation but with a shorter, better designed household questionnaire.