24 February 2025
45 Pipitea Street, Wel ington 6011
Phone +64 4 495 7200
dia.govt.nz
David Singh
fyi-request-33550-
[email address]
Tēnā koe David
OIA request 25/26 0761 Request for Citizenship Data and Policy
Thank you for your Official Information Act (Act) request received by the Department of Internal
Affairs (Department) on 19 January 2026.
You requested –
Can you provide data for Citizenship by Grant applications relating to individuals
associated with the Cook Islands, Niue, or Tokelau (for example, cases falling under section
8(4) of the legislation) that were approved between 2021 and 2025 (inclusive)?
1. Specifically, can you provide:
-
The number of New Zealand citizenship grants per year, broken down by the
territory to which the applicant is connected (for example, the Cook Islands, Niue,
and Tokelau); and
-
The total number of New Zealand citizenship grants in this cohort, broken down by
the applicant’s country of birth
Guidelines for assessing city (town) of birth
2. Can you share any guidelines or internal instructions used when assessing an
applicant’s city (or town) of birth for New Zealand passport applications, particularly
for overseas births?
Historical city name changes
3. If available, can the Department share any reference material or lists used to account
for historical city name changes, including changes due to regime change, renaming, or
administrative restructuring?
For example:
- Bombay → Mumbai
- Nanking → Nanjing
- Saigon → Ho Chi Minh City
Birth city no longer exists
4. How does the Department handle cases where the applicant’s birth city no longer
exists, for example where it has been merged into another city or administrative area?
Birth city name has changed (use of historical vs current names)
5. How does the Department handle cases where the applicant’s birth city has changed
name since the time of birth?
In particular:
a) Is the city of birth recorded in the passport required to use the current official
name, or can a historical name also be used?
Does the applicant have any discretion in choosing which name is recorded, where both
the historical and current names clearly refer to the same city?
On 17 February 2026 you were provided a response to question one.
For the remainder of your request, you were notified that in accordance with section 15(1)(b) of
the Act, the Department had decided to provide the requested information to you and was
preparing the information for release. You were advised the final response would be to you by
no later than 24 February 2026. I can now provide you with the fol owing information.
Policy documents provided in this response are from ‘Tuwhiria te Tikanga’ (Tuwhiria); the
Department’s online operational policy resource and knowledge management system. The
purpose of Tuwhiria is to have standardised business knowledge across the life and identity
products and services provided by Identity Services, within the Regulatory and Identity Services
(RIS) branch. This enables staff to find the correct information quickly and ensure consistent
application of the most up to date accurate policies and procedures by all staff.
Questions two, three, five and five (a)
The place of birth recorded on a New Zealand passport is determined by the New Zealand birth
record or New Zealand citizenship record.
Please see attached alongside this letter Appendix A, which contains the
Policy - Birthplace
details to be displayed in a passport. This policy explains how a place of birth should be
recorded, including guidance on recording a city when its name has changed due to a change in
government, the birth city no longer exists, has been renamed, or other recognised forms of
change defined by the Department.
For further information please see attached alongside this letter - Appendix A, under heading –
‘Official changes to country names’.
Please also see attached alongside this letter Appendix B -
Guidelines – Current and historical
names of countries and territories. This guidelines page is used by both citizenship and passports
Life and Identity Services Officers when there is clarification needed for what place of birth can
be recorded when a countries name has changed.
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I note that Appendices A and B make reference to the International Civil Aviation Organization
(ICAO) Standards, specifical y document 3 –
Specifications Common to all Machine-Readable
Travel Documents (MRTDs). This information is publicly available here:
https://www.icao.int/sites/default/files/publications/DocSeries/9303_p3_cons_en.pdf
Another relevant component of policy held in Tuwhiria that is consulted when guidance is
required on recording a place of birth for a citizenship record is the
Guidelines – Place and
country of birth scenarios for citizenship section. I can advise that the information requested will
be made publicly available within the next four weeks via a proactively released Official
Information Act response, accessible her
e https://www.dia.govt.nz/Official-Information-Act-
Requests-2. You can search the response by using ‘ctrl’ + ‘f’ and typing ‘OIA 2526-0809’ in the
search field.
Therefore, I must refuse this part of your request pursuant to section 18(d) of the Act: the
information requested will soon be publicly available.
Question four
When determining the place of birth to be recorded on a citizenship record (which then
determines what is recorded on a passport record), where there has been official change to the
place or country of birth, the applicant may have either:
• the current place or country name; OR
• an historic place or country name, when
• the historic name is recorded on their document, OR
• if the historic name was in use at the time of the applicant's birth and it is consistent
with the documents provided.
Please see attached alongside this letter Appendix C -
Policy – Place and country of birth for
citizenship under heading titled ‘
Official changes to place and country names (historic names)’
for further information.
Please also see attached alongside this letter Appendix B -
Guidelines – Current and historical
names of countries and territories as it is also referred to if required to make the appropriate
assessment.
As this information may be of interest to other members of the public, the Department has
decided to proactively release a copy of this response on the DIA website. Al requestor data,
including your name and contact details, will be removed prior to release. The released
response will be made available here
: https://www.dia.govt.nz/Official-Information-Act-
Requests-2.
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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.
Ngā mihi
Julia Taylor
Director Branch Performance
Regulatory and Identity Services
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