The General Register Office for Scotland is an Executive Agency of the Scottish Executive, accountable to Scottish Ministers, that administers the registration of births, deaths, marriages, divorces and adoptions, and is responsible for the statutes relating to the formalities of marriage and conduct of civil marriage in Scotland. It is also responsible for the census of Scotland's population and the National Health Service Central Register. Initially ministers of the Church of Scotland were responsible for keeping parish records of baptisms and marriages. Later the Privy Council of Scotland, following the suggestion General Assembly of the Church of Scotland enacted that all parish ministers should keep a record of baptisms, burials and marriages. This situation continued until 1854 when Parliament passed an Act transferring responsibility to the State. The Registration of Births, Deaths and Marriages (Scotland) Act 1854 created the General Registry Office of Births, Deaths and Marriages, headed by the Registrar General with the appointment of registrars in every parish. It also provided that the Registrar General should produce an annual report to be forwarded to the Home Secretary to be laid before Parliament containing a general abstract of the numbers of births, deaths and marriages registered during the previous year. The first general abstract (relating to 1855) was submitted in 1856. The Registrar General was also Deputy to the Lord Clerk Register. The Deputy Clerk Register had to be an Advocate of not less than ten years standing. William Pitt Dundas was the first holder of the combined post of Deputy Clerk Register and Registrar General from September 1854 until April 1880. His successor, Roger Montgomerie, died six months after his appointment, and Mr Pitt Dundas resumed office for around a year, until the appointment of Sir Stair Agnew, KCB. The last person to hold the combined posts was Sir James Patten McDougall, KCB, in office from May 1909 to March 1919. Originally, this was the supervision of birth, death and marriage registration. It was expanded to include the conduct of the 1861 Census and all subsequent ones (working closely with the Registrar General to ensure consistency) and other statistical functions. In 1920 the Registrar General (Scotland) Act 1920 was passed which provided for the appointment by the Secretary of State for Scotland a whole-time Registrar General, Dr James Craufurd Dunlop, (previously Medical Superintendent of Statistics) was appointed