15 July 2019
45 Pipitea Street, Wel ington 6011
Phone +64 4 495 7200
Email
[email address]
Brodie Fraser
Websit
e www.dia.govt.nz
fyi-request-10546-
[email address]
Dear Brodie
Official Information Act 1982 request 1819-0812 Statistics on gender markers
I refer to your request received by the Department of Internal Affairs (Department) on 17
June 2019. This response is provided to you under the Official Information Act 1982 (OIA).
You requested—
1) How many, if any, people have requested to use the gender-neutral “X” option on
passports since the legislation was introduced, broken down by year?
2) How many, if any, people have requested to change the gender markers on their
passport via self-determination, since the legislation was introduced, broken down by
year?
3) How many, if any, people have gone through Family Court processes to change the
gender markers on their birth certificate in the past five years, broken down by year?
1) How many, if any, people have requested to use the gender-neutral “X” option on
passports since the legislation was introduced, broken down by year?
Passports issued with gender recorded as X 2005 to 2007 inclusive
In 2005, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) changed the standard for
recording ‘unspecified’ gender on passports from a dash (-) to an X. Therefore, in order to
comply with the standards, in November 2005 the Passport Office began issuing such
passports with an X. Please note that how we recognise gender is in line with ICAO standards
rather than being prescribed in the Passports Act 1992.
Year
Passports changed from
(-), M or F to X
2005
9
2006
27
2007
17
The Department wishes to advise that a small number of old records have not been included
in this data set as the full content of the historic passport records was not transferred over
to the new operating system. The list provided relates to applicants who applied for a new
passport in 2005 to 2007 inclusive and which were issued using “X”. It is possible that an
applicant sought a change to how their gender was recorded (in terms of other records held
by a government agency), but that they did not advise the Passport Office/did not seek a
change to how this was displayed on their Passport record at that time.
Passports issued with gender recorded as X 2008 to 2018 inclusive
Year
Passports changed
Year
Passports changed from
from either M or F to
either M or F to X
X
2008
17
2014
4
2009
19
2015
6
2010
17
2016
8
2011
22
2017
11
2012
23
2018
8
2013
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2) How many, if any, people have requested to change the gender markers on their
passport via self-determination, since the legislation was introduced, broken down by
year?
The table below sets out the number of people who have changed the gender marker on
their passport since the passport gender policy was amended in 2012.
Applicants could potentially have also gone through the Family Court process, but the
Passport Office would not necessarily be aware of this, as it is not a requirement to have
completed this process in order to change gender on a passport. The data below is
therefore based on the information that is held by the Department via passport records.
Year
Passports changed
Passports changed
from M to F
from F to M
2012
5
10
2013
21
10
2014
21
15
2015
38
13
2016
56
40
2017
51
29
2018
64
52
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3) How many, if any, people have gone through Family Court processes to change the
gender markers on their birth certificate in the past five years, broken down by year?
The table below sets out the number of people from 2014 to 2018 inclusive who have
changed the gender marker on their birth certificate through the Family Court process.
Please note that it is not possible to tell the original gender recorded (M, F or I) as these
records are closed.
Year
Change to F Change to M
Total
2014
15
2
17
2015
7
3
10
2016
0
1
1
2017
7
2
9
2018
6
2
8
You have the right to seek an investigation and review by the Ombudsman of this decision.
Information about how to make a complaint is available at
www.ombudsman.parliament.nz
or freephone 0800 802 602.
Yours sincerely
Briget Ridden
Manager Branch Development and Support
Service Delivery and Operations
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