Functions
PART I
SUMMARY
THE Registrar General's Department was established on 1st April 1949 by the Registrar General (Establishment) Ordinance (Cap. 100), and now comprises the Land Office, Companies, Insurance, Trade Marks, Patents, Marriage, and Births and Deaths Registries, and the Offices of the Official Receiver in Bankruptcy and Companies Winding-up, the Official Trustee, and the Official Solicitor in Lunacy. With the exception of the Marriage and Births and Deaths Registries all these Offices and Registries are, along with the Headquarters of the Department, located on the 11th floor of the Central Government Offices, West Wing, Lower Albert Road, Victoria. The locations of the Marriage and Births and Deaths Registries are given in Parts VI and VII relating to these Registries.
Staff
2. At the end of the year the establishment of the Department con- sisted of the Registrar General, a Deputy Registrar General, two Senior Legal Assistants, ten Legal Assistants, a Senior Assistant Registrar, twenty-six Assistant Registrars, two Executive Officers and 180 other officers. There was also a supernumerary staff of one Assistant Registrar General, one Legal Assistant, three Assistant Registrars and fourteen other officers. Table I shows how this staff, permanent and supernumer- ary, totalling 242 officers, was distributed among the various Branches of the Department on 31st March 1963. As indicated thereon vacancies existed for an Assistant Registrar General, five Legal Assistants, three Assistant Registrars and three other officers.
General Review
3. The Department's functions are such that business conditions are immediately reflected in its work. Accordingly since Hong Kong enjoyed a year of great industrial and commercial activity, it followed that the Land Office and the Companies and Trade Marks Registries were extremely busy, and new records were established in the numbers of land transactions recorded, and of companies and trade marks registered.
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