General Register Office: Local Registration Services: Correspondence and Papers

RG 21

1836-1998

Correspondence with selected local registration districts relating to the creation of the original registration districts and dealing with matters such as the appointment of registration officers, registration schemes, boundary changes and the provision of accommodation for registration purposes.

For correspondence with the Poor Law Commission and Board and the Local Government Board, see pieces 191-195 in MH 19

Correspondence with the Home Office concerning registration districts is in HO 39/4

Public Record(s)

English

189 files and volumes

Open unless otherwise stated

From 1976 Office of Population Censuses and Surveys

Topics

Census

Series is accruing

The first registration districts were based on Poor Law Unions but could be, and were, varied to meet local circumstances, in particular local government boundary changes, by Order of the Registrar General. The Local Government Act 1929 required a general rearrangement of districts but the need for the Registrar General's formal order in some circumstances did not lapse until the coming into force of the Registration Service Act 1953, which made provision for administrative rearrangement. The earliest registration officers were paid partly by their fees and partly by the Poor Law Guardians who appointed them; when the office of guardians was abolished under the Local Government Act 1929 responsibility for the appointment and payment of the registrars was transferred to local government.