New GRO download feature? Will they extend births after 1922 at some point?

[AntonyMMM]

In Ireland. GRO records involving  personal data are closed for the lifetime of individuals which is assumed to be 100 years. There also are GDPR regulations (e.g. Elector registers have been taken down from online). The 100 year rule also applies to the Census. There is a basis in law for this, it is not arbitrary.
Familysearch has done its own thing, transcribing GRO records over recent decades.

We are lucky in the UK that access to birth/marriage/death records is granted by statute, and so not subject to GDPR/Data Protection legislation ...... if that were to change doing research within the last 100 years would become a lot more difficult !

[coombs]

Thanks all for your replies. So now 1923 is available, so I guess in January 2025 they will release digital downloads of 1924 births. My great uncle was born September 1923 but I obtained a copy 20 years ago from the local Durham BMD search but it was a typed copy when I got the cert.

My uncle was born in September 1944 so if I wanted to obtain his birth cert, I would have to send off for it the usual channels, as it will likely be 20 years before it will be available as a digital download.

[sandiep]

maggsie  familysearch have records but they dont have images and most dont have full details

[Bob Frewen]

In Ireland. GRO records involving  personal data are closed for the lifetime of individuals which is assumed to be 100 years. There also are GDPR regulations (e.g. Elector registers have been taken down from online). The 100 year rule also applies to the Census. There is a basis in law for this, it is not arbitrary.
Familysearch has done its own thing, transcribing GRO records over recent decades.

We are lucky in the UK that access to birth/marriage/death records is granted by statute, and so not subject to GDPR/Data Protection legislation ...... if that were to change doing research within the last 100 years would become a lot more difficult !

Not quite, although current English restrictions don’t concern genealogists. There was a 100-year rule which was shortened to 30yrs by the the Public Records Act 1967 which in turn was replaced by the Freedom of Information Act 2000, lowering the limit to the current 20 years. Some records deemed ‘sensitive’ remain inaccessible and have higher limits. I don’t know what prevails in  N. Irl and Scotland, but GDPR in the UK is almost identical to that in the EU, having been ‘lifted’ and shoved into your 2018 Data Protection Act. In Ireland its 100/75/25 yrs for BMDs but there are some work-arounds.
It's also worth remembering that a birth in 1923 and registered in 1924 won't appear until next year.

[gaffy]

Under the 100 year rule, the GRO in Northern Ireland extends internet access to births dynamically (ie. continuously in real time, rather than an annual exercise to upload a year of new records). For example, I was just looking at the birth for someone born on 2 January 1924.

[coombs]

Many births that took place in late 1923 were registered in Jan or Feb 1924 due to the 6 week time frame allowed, and even then some births were registered later than that. About a year ago I looked up the GRO birth record on FreeREG for famous gangster Frankie Fraser born 13 Dec 1923, it appears in the Jan, Feb, Mar quarter of 1924 so his birth was probably registered in January 1924, or maybe February.

A pal born 18 Dec 1944 once showed me his birth cert, it was registered I think 27th or 28th Dec 1944. If it had been registered on 1 Jan 1945 it would appear in the quarter ending March 1945.

[AntonyMMM]

As you point out - births (and deaths) are always indexed by the date of registration - the date of the event itself is irrelevant, so they can sometimes appear indexed in a different quarter and that is the date that will cover their release date under the current GRO policy.

[frostyknight]

In Ireland. GRO records involving  personal data are closed for the lifetime of individuals which is assumed to be 100 years. There also are GDPR regulations (e.g. Elector registers have been taken down from online). The 100 year rule also applies to the Census. There is a basis in law for this, it is not arbitrary.
Familysearch has done its own thing, transcribing GRO records over recent decades.

Indexes for Irish BMD's up to 1958 are on Ancestry and Familysearch.  Don't know if they're also on Find My Past.

The actual certificates are available to view, free, for births over 100 years ago, marriages over 75 years ago, and deaths over 50 years ago. Available on irishgenealogy.ie

[Kiltaglassan]

The actual certificates are available to view, free, for births over 100 years ago, marriages over 75 years ago, and deaths over 50 years ago. Available on irishgenealogy.ie

See https://www.irishgenealogy.ie/en/news/154-update-to-the-civil-records-3
(Note they didn't bother changing the year date to 2023)

Birth register records – 1864 to 1922, Marriage register records – 1845 to 1947 & Death register records – 1871* to 1972.

BMD's for the six Ulster Counties (NI) up to the end of 1921.