10th December 1999
CIGO Launches its On-Line Petition

CIGO has launched an on-line petition to gather signatures together to convince the Minister for Health & Children that services at the General Register Office in Dublin need to be improved and that copies of some of the GRO’s records should be made available through the National Library of Ireland. Details about the petition can be seen here and other commentary on the GRO and the petition can be seen here.

14th August 1999
GRO (Dublin) Announces ‘On-Line’ Modernisation

Birth, death and marriage certificates are to be scanned on to a computerised database in a £7m modernisation scheme for the Irish civil registration service. However, CIGO does not agree with the GRO when it states that in future “there will be no need for paper copies of the records of birth, marriage and death certificates” (sic). It will of course only be government and other state agencies that will have direct access to the new computer database. The need for paper records (whether certificates or otherwise) will always be required by genealogists and family historians and CIGO has been in contact with senior officials at the GRO to make sure that this need is recognised and accepted. The announcement of the GRO’s plans was covered in The Irish Independent.

7th August 1999
CIGO Public Meeting about the GRO (Dublin)

On Saturday, 7th August CIGO held a Public Meeting at the Freemasons’ Hall, Molesworth Street, Dublin, to gauge public feeling at the ever declining level of public service at the GRO. The meeting was so well attended that there was hardly even standing room at the back of the hall. Public anger at the GRO – and what it sees as the GRO’s disregard for the provision of a quality public service – was evident and at times feelings boiled over into scenes of frustration and outright anger. The result of the meeting was the compilation by CIGO of a six page report of recommendations which was presented to Brian Cowen TD, Minister for Health & Children, and separately to all of his ministerial colleagues. The Irish Independent subsequently carried a short article about the issue.