buff cards were issued to children under 16 but did not carry a class code. Expiry of the Act On 21 February 1952, it ceased to be necessary to carry an identity card, and the Act itself formally expired on 22 May 1952. The last person prosecuted under the Act was Harry Willcock, who had refused to produce his identity card for a police officer in December 1950. Even after the National Registration system was abandoned in 1952, the National Registration number persisted, being used within the National Health Service, for voter registration, and for the National Insurance system. Importance of the register The register is particularly important for genealogists because: The individual records from the 1921 census were protected by the privacy provisions that forbade their release with 100 years of the census being taken, and thus they only became available in January 2022. The individual records concerning England and Wales from the 1931 census were entirely destroyed by a fire of indeterminate cause in December 1942. No census was undertaken during 1941. The register records the precise date of birth of those registered. The lack of both the 1931 and 1941 census means that "the Register provides the most complete survey of the population of England and Wales between 1921 and 1951, making it an invaluable resource for family, social and local historians". Indeed, prior to the release of records from the 1921 census, the 1939 register was the most-complete detailed record of the population of England and Wales since 1911 to be publicly available. Unlike the decennial censuses, the 1939 Register was designed as a working document for the duration of the war, and it was later used in the foundation of the National Health Service. It therefore records individuals born after 1939 as well as subsequent changes of name, notably in the case of single women who married after 1939. Access to information England and Wales The original register books relating to England and Wales were collated and maintained by the Central National Registration Office at Southport, Merseyside, and are now held by the Health and Social Care Information Centre (NHS Digital). In 2010, the NHS began offering to conduct searches of the registers compiled on 29 September 1939 to members of the public upon payment of a fee, and would provide extracts of the information found so long as it was known that it only