Registrar General's final thoughts

On August 5th Scotland's Registrar General Duncan MacNiven retired from the post he had held since 2003. I'd like to wish Duncan the very best for the future, and to thank him for his help in the past, both in granting permissions for image use within publications I have worked on, but specifically with something he did last year that showed what a gent he truly is!

At the beginning of last year I contacted Duncan after receiving notice of the decision concerning the right of an applicant to secure information from the 1939 English and Welsh National Register, a decision successfully appealed after being told initially that it would not be possible. I dropped him a note to say that in writing up the news for a couple of forthcoming magazines, I knew that the next question that would be asked would be "what about Scotland?" Duncan emailed me back within a couple of days to say that he had had another look at the Scottish legislation for our equivalent records, and as a consequence, saw no reason whatsoever not to release them. As a result, not only did he make them available to the public before the authorities down south did, he also made them cheaper to access - now that's the kind of registrar general that anyone would want! :)

Duncan's final annual report on Scottish demographic changes for 2010 is available at the GROS website, with comments on its contents by the man himself. This can be viewed at www.gro-scotland.gov.uk/press/news2011/rg-on-population-changes.html

Chris