Registering the birth of your baby

For babies born in neighbouring areas you should contact that area's registration service:

• Bradford Council (this includes those born at Airedale Hospital)
• City of York Council (this includes those born at York Hospital)
• Darlington Borough Council
• City of Doncaster Council
• Durham County Council
• East Riding of Yorkshire Council
• Lancashire County Council
• Leeds City Council
• Middlesbrough Council (including those born at James Cook Hospital)
• Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council
• Stockon-on-Tees Borough Council
• Westmorland and Furness Council

Baby born outside of North Yorkshire

If you are a North Yorkshire resident and your baby was born outside of North Yorkshire, you can register your baby’s birth by declaration at any North Yorkshire registration office. You will not receive a birth certificate at the appointment as this will be posted to you later by the relevant registration service. You may find it quicker to register the birth in the relevant district.

Baby born at James Cook Hospital

If you are a North Yorkshire resident and your baby was born at James Cook Hospital, you can register the birth at Middlesbrough registration office, Northallerton registration office or Richmond registration office and obtain a birth certificate at your appointment.

Baby born at York District Hospital

If you are a North Yorkshire resident and your baby was born at York District Hospital, you can register the birth at York registration office, Malton registration office or Selby registration office and obtain a birth certificate at your appointment.

Baby born at Airedale Hospital

If you are a North Yorkshire resident and your baby was born at Airedale Hospital, you can register the birth at Bradford registration office or Skipton registration office and obtain a birth certificate at your appointment.

If the following circumstances apply, please contact us for advice:

• stillbirths or simultaneous birth and death appointments 
• if the mother is deceased
• court orders and adoptions
• if you need to register more than four children
• if your baby was not born in North Yorkshire

Find out who can register a birth on the government website as it depends on whether the baby's parents were married or in a civil partnership at the time of the birth.

When registering the birth, you should know:

• place and date of the birth
• name, surname and sex of the baby
• parents' names, surnames and address(s)
• places and dates of parents' birth
• date of parents' marriage or civil partnership, if applicable
• parents' jobs
• mother's maiden surname

You might not need to give all this information depending on who is registering the birth.

Please check all information carefully when the registrar asks you to do so as later changes are difficult to make and a fee may be charged to make any corrections. Once your baby's name and surname have been decided, this can only be changed by re-registering a birth. 

You should take at least one form of identification when you go to the register office. You can use:

• passport
• birth certificate
• deed poll
• driving licence
• proof of address, for example a utility bill
• Council Tax bill
• marriage or civil partnership certificate

You will also need:

• a credit or debit card to pay for a birth certificate
• an interpreter if no-one attending the appointment speaks English

Yes, you can order a copy of a birth certificate online from our certificates page.

Birth declaration

If you wish to register a birth which happened outside of North Yorkshire, this is known as a birth declaration. The appointment takes longer and you cannot take away a birth certificate from the appointment. It is often quicker and easier to travel to the district in which your baby was born.

Contact us for all requests for birth declarations. 

Re-registration

If the child's natural father is not included on the original birth record and you would like the details adding to the record, you must apply to register your child's birth. The process for re-registering your child's birth depends on whether you:

• are not married
• are natural parents and got married or formed a civil partnership

Please contact us for all requests for birth re-registrations. 

Personal information that you are required by law to provide for a registration will be kept by the relevant local registration officer. The local registration officer will also send a copy of it to the General Register Office for England and Wales so a central record of all registrations can be maintained.

A copy of any register entry will be provided to any applicant, so long as they supply enough information to identify the entry and pay the appropriate fee. The copy can only be issued as a paper certified copy (a "certificate"). An application for a certificate can be made to either the local register office or to the General Register Office.

The General Register Office makes indexes, for the central record of registrations, publicly available in order to help members of the public identify the registration they might need. The register office also makes a local index available for this purpose.

The local register office may choose to make the information contained within local indexes available online. This will be done in order to help members of the public identify the registration they might need. Any information placed online must be done in a way that is compliant with the Data Protection Act and Human Rights Act.

Additionally, confidential information for statistical purposes which you are required by law to give to the local registration officer, and other information provided voluntarily, will be passed to the UK Statistics Authority for the preparation and supply of statistics.

As well as providing certificates, local registration officers and the General Register Office may make registration information available to other organisations, for the following purposes:

• statistical or research purposes
• administrative purposes by official bodies, such as ensuring their records are up to date
• fraud prevention or detection, immigration and passport purposes

You can see further information on data held by the Registrar General on the passport office privacy information page on the government's website.