Sample birth certificates from Australia, and other Commonwealth nations

5th August 2009

[naturalman1975]

I have spent way too much time today looking at these.

I thought other people might find it useful to see them in one place.

NSW Australia, 1992 certified copy of 1857 certificate.

Queensland Australia, 1959 certified copy of 1936 certificate.

NSW Australia, 1999 certificate.

Victoria, Australia, 1955 certified copy of 1855 certificate.

Victoria, Australia, 2000 certified copy of 1901 certificate.

Great Britain, 2007 certified copy of 1894 certificate.

Rhodesia, 1963 certificate.

Canada, 1967 certificate.

New Zealand birth certificate

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Thanks for posting....

[Raycpa]

sample law:

http://www.paclii.org/nr/legis/num_act/bdamo19571966293/

PART II - REGISTRATION OF BIRTHS.

Register of Births.

6.-(1) The Registrar shall register each birth occurring on the Island, particulars of which are furnished to him in accordance with this Ordinance and, for this purpose, shall maintain a Register of Births.

(2) The registration of a birth under this Part shall be effected by an entry in the Register of Births in accordance with Form l.

(3) The Administrator may certify that a register or record of births maintained or purporting to have been maintained under the authority or approval of the Administrator or a predecessor in office of the Administrator and in existence immediately prior to the commencement of this Ordinance is, to the best of his knowledge and belief, a true record of births that have occurred on the Island from and including the twenty-fifth day of January, 1915, and the register or record so certified shall form part of the Register of Births.

Particulars of birth to be furnished.

7.-(1) Subject to the next succeeding sub-section, where a child is born on the Island, a parent of the child shall within twenty-one days after the date of the birth, notify the Registrar of the birth and furnish to the Registrar such information as the Registrar requires for the purpose of registering the birth.

Penalty: Ten pounds.

(2) Where the notification of the birth of a child cannot be given by a parent of the child, the occupier of the building or place where the child is born shall, within twenty-one days after the date of the birth, notify the Registrar of the birth and furnish to the: Registrar such information as the Registrar requires for the purpose of registering the birth.

Penalty: Ten pounds.

[wndawmn666]

Hi,

Great info. The link is to New South Wales and I’m not sure if their information is the same as South Australia.

I have no clue about Australia...

[SirJohnBarleycorn]

That is legislation for New South Wales.

You need to find the legislation for South Australia.

That is like citing a California law and claiming it applies to New York.

[Raycpa]

http://www.familyhistorysa.info/births-marriages-deaths/index.html Information included on birth certificates and district records

Provision was made on the certificates for the information tabulated below and marked yes. However, on many certificates, some of that information was omitted by the informant and/or registrar. Theoretically, the same information was provided in the district records. Note that in some cases certificates were issued on the older stationery until it was exhausted.

start finish	7-1842 6-1856	6-1856 12-1874	1-1875 7-1907	7-1907 6-1948	6-1948 1-1968	1-1968 present
Date of birth	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes
Place of birth	no	yes	> 1882	yes	yes	yes
Name of child	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes
Sex	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes
Father's full name	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes
Father's age, birth place	no	no	no	yes	yes	yes
Father's occupation	yes	yes	no	yes	yes	yes
Usual residence	no	yes	no	yes	yes	yes
Mother's maiden name	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes
Mother's age, birth place	no	no	no	yes	yes	yes
Mother's former married surname	no	no	no	no	no	yes
Year of marriage	no	no	no	yes	yes	yes
Number of previous living, dead issue	no	no	no	yes	yes	yes
Informant's signature, descriptn, residence	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes
Authorized person	no	no	no	no	yes	no
Registration District	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes	no
Registration date	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes
District Registrar's signature	yes	yes	yes	yes	yes	no

[Raycpa]

I’m am not making any conclusions, simply posting information that might be tangentially related.

[Raycpa]

http://www.familyhistorysa.info/births-marriages-deaths/index.html

[Plummz]

According to that chart, the Bomford cert should NOT have his mother’s maiden surname on it...

but it does.

[Dajjal]

obumpa

[Tennessee Nana]

What year is that New Zealand BC ???

It is recent because the form is in Maori also

By law everything has to be in both lauguages now...

[naturalman1975]

But none of the samples you posted look similar to the Kenya and Austalia ones in question.

Um - take a look at the common format of all of Australian birth certificates posted - now have a look at the 'Kenyan' certificate.

Do you have any that look similar that you can post?

Yes, and I've posted them here. The similarities seem pretty obvious to me. I can't post anything that looks identical because there are slight differences from state to state and time to time, but the overall format has been consistent for at least fifty years. The certificates from NSW, Queensland, and Victoria show the similarities, and so does the Kenyan certificate. I'd love to be able to find a South Australian certificate from the same period which should be identical - I haven't been able to so far.

So far, I’m sticking with the Kenya one is real and the Austalia one is a fake, made to look like the Kenya one on purpose and uploaded just to throw everyone offtrack.

So an Australian format birth certificate must be a fake when it comes from Australia, but it's genuine when it shows up in Kenya?

[naturalman1975]

Because both countries use English Common Law (or did as members of the Commonwealth and British Empire), they were subject to the provisions of the English Common Law of Births and Deaths Registration Act 1953.

Utter garbage.

Common law refers to part of British constitutional law. It does mean that most law is identical in all places that use Common law - it just means there are certain ancient underlying principles that apply.

Acts of the British Parliament do not generally apply in Australia and haven't since 1942 when the Australian government ratified the Statute of Westminster of 1931. That statute made it explicit than an Act of the British Parliament would only apply in Australia if the Australian government chose to incorporate it into Australian law.

The English Common Law of Births and Deaths Registration Act 1953 (assuming such an act exists - I haven't checked but the name doesn't look like it's in the right format to me) never applied in Australia.

[naturalman1975]

On Bomford’s cert at the bottom is says: Deputy Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages and it is dated 1964.

How could Douglas Gordon Young work for this office in 1964 when it wasn’t created until 1975

Because the Bomford certificate is from SOUTH AUSTRALIA. The quote given here is from NEW SOUTH WALES. They are different states with different state government departments.

Like the United States, Australia is a collection of states with some powers reserved to the states, and some in the hands of the federal government under the Constitution of Australia. Registration of Births is a state level responsibility, handled by state government departments.

[wndawmn666]

Hi,

Thank you. I figured that out a few minutes after I posted. :-)

[naturalman1975]

This would all be much simpler if we didn’t have states...

[El Gato]

But speaking as somebody whose seen a lot of Australian birth certificates,

Funny then that the one that you did post from the early to mid 60s looks nothing like the "Bomford"/Australian or "Obama"/Kenyan ones.

What we need are other South Australia BCs from that period, or other Kenyan ones from the same time frame

[El Gato]

Well, this says a lot. On Bomford’s cert at the bottom is says: Deputy Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages and it is dated 1964. How could Douglas Gordon Young work for this office in 1964 when it wasn’t created until 1975.

Just playing devil's advocate, could it be that South Australia changed methods and terminology 11 years before New South Wales? (Bomford is from South Australis, that info was from New South Wales.

It's like being suprised that Texas doesn't have the same birth certificate format a New York.

[wndawmn666]

Yeah, after I visited the link to the actual site and saw that it was for South Wales I realized it didn’t apply. That was about five minutes after my post.

Thanks! :-)

[naturalman1975]

For goodness sake.

Do you expect me to have a copy of every single type of Australian birth certificate ever issued? I think that's a bit unrealistic.

What I can do is show that there was a common format (that is what it is actually called) used for all Australian birth certificates and provide examples that show that format. A format that is evident on the Bomford certificate as well.

Let's look at this together.

The first five birth certificates in that composite are Australia (the alleged Bomford certificate is included). I think the commonality of features between all five certificates is pretty obvious personally. The last three are from elsewhere in the Commonwealth (England, Canada, Rhodesia). They are obviously different.

The alleged Bomford certificate looks like an Australian certificate. So does the alleged Kenyan certificate.

[DieHard the Hunter]

Gidday mate,

Having them side-by-side is a helpful way to look at it. Thanks — I wonder if it might be convenient for you to please place the four-or-five Australian certificates next to this “Kenyan” one, for ease of comparisons?

I am going into our safe to fetch out our family’s certificates, just for the Hell of it, to have a look-see. Between us in my family we have British, Canadian and NZ certificates covering the Obama birth period — all Commonwealth countries.