My complaint to the passport office and the response I received…

[PassportProblemo]

So, I recently applied for a new UK passport. During the application process, I was asked for my “gender” and given the options “male” and “female”. At no point was I asked my sex. Assuming there was an error, I submitted the following complaint to the passport office:

"Hello,

I recently applied for a new passport as mine is nearing expiry.

As part of the application, I was asked to provide my "gender". The options offered were "female" and "male". As "male" and "female" refer to one's sex, I do not believe that this section is correct in asking for the applicant's gender.

Therefore, may I ask why you are using the term "gender" rather than "sex"? Also, do you plan on ever correcting this to avoid confusion to your customers?

Kind regards,"

During the complaints process, it asked if I would like my response via phone or writing. I requested writing.

Two days later, I received a phone call from the Passport Office… The woman said that the office is just following their internal guidance here, which says that this is what they should do. I asked for her response in writing. She sent me the following email:

“Dear PassportProblemo,

Thank you for your enquiry.

The passport application process is structured in accordance with The Gender Recognition Act 2004 which came into effect on 4 April 2005.

For more information on The Gender Recognition Act 2004 and how it applies to the passport application process please see the below link:

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2004/7/contents

Yours sincerely,”

(I have removed the satisfaction survey link they included in their email)

Right, so what do we do next? How do we challenge their holy “internal guidance”?!?

There's some official document somewhere that says the purpose of the male/female field in a passport is not to record the sex of the bearer but to assist visual confirmation of identity by immigration officers and others by recording the "gender presentation" of the bearer (or words to that effect).

So, officially, the passport is supposed to record if you "look like" a man or a woman.

I write this with a straight face.

Okay, but then why use the terms “male” and “female” as they refer to one’s sex? Wouldn’t it be more accurate to say “masculine” or “feminine”?

I actually get why this might be. If the person has changed their name to that of the opposite sex/neutral and/or they look like they're presenting as that sex then to have the other sex on the passport would cause a lot of confusion. It's true that it is just to make sure you look like the photo.

Stupid as it seems.

Otherwise why not issue you one passport to last your lifetime?

it’s not much help to know that the person was born female if they present themselves as a man. Surely it’s just this?

Right, but wouldn’t it be better to ask for the applicant’s sex, and then note their “gender” under “official observations”?

For example, I have a “Dr” title that is noted in mine.

I recently renewed mine 6 days from application to getting it back.

its a wonder when people are wasting their time like this. Just fill in the application & stop wasting their time.

That's interesting. Once when I renewed my passport the replacement arrived with M rather than F next to gender. When I called up to let them know about the error they told me I'd need to come in to the passport office to prove my gender. They backed down when I asked how on earth they expected me to prove that without an intimate exam and reissued the document.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/gender-recognition/gender-recognition-accessible

This is what they should have linked.

Unlike the gender recognition certificate (GRC) the issue of a passport in an acquired gender does not give legal recognition of the change of gender.

It is just for identity purposes. Not sure how it works when the person still looks like their birth sex on their birth photo.

How am I wasting their time when they have terminology errors in official documentation?!?

Given that any man can change the marker on his passport from M to F with only the slightest of evidence*, and vice versa, I suppose that gender is what the Passport Office is recording.

It isn't even a matter of presentation. There are transwomen with beards, like Alex Drummond.

*e.g. a letter from your doctor or medical consultant confirming your change of gender is likely to be permanent. Gender GP will provide one of those https://www.gendergp.com/gender-marker/

But what if they do?
What can immigration say if the British passport records only gender not sex?

“You don’t look like a man/female”.
“No I’m trans” or “ how rude” depending on passenger.
“Er, right ,on you go”

I renewed the British passport of my niece online from overseas last year, and I cannot remember being asked for her gender (I would have noticed, having been through FWR school!). Possibly I got a different form. I'd be interested what the final outcome is for OP.

With the new self ID law here in Germany, we are going to see this stuff cropping up here too (I'll probably need to apply for a new passport later this year, so I will take note).

Well, yes, obviously. Passport control don't check people's chromosomes, gametes or genitals. They check if the passport appears to belong to the person in front of them, if the passport says F but the person in front of them looks like a man or vice versa, this causes more unnecessary delays and problems for everyone involved. This isn't rocket science.

How does one “look like a man”?

By having male secondary sexual characteristics, usually. At least, this is what would be visible to passport control as, once again, they don't check chromosomes, gametes or genitals.

Like a beard, for instance? Or broad shoulders and narrow hips? A prominent Adam's apple? Large hands and feet?

Some if not all of those will apply to transwomen with an F marker in their passports.

Honestly, this is such a spurious complaint and designed entirely to be spiteful towards trans people who apparently aren't allowed anything that would make their lives easier by the GC movement. It doesn't affect you in the slightest what other people's passports say, nor is it your business frankly. This isn't a feminist issue, it's just pure spite and throwing your toys out of the pram. You can't complain trans people out of existence.

Just don’t get a passport then ffs. I can’t believe my taxes are paying for some poor jobsworth to have to respond to your inane witterings. You know which box to tick, just tick it an move on.

There are times when it’s critically important to register accurately sex rather than gender - but this isn’t one of them.

It’s all facial recognition of you the person versus your photograph at the egates. There is no background cross checking whether you are male or female. It’s does the photo match the face full stop.

If you go to a person, then it’s fingerprinting plus often a desk camera for facial recognition. It literally doesn’t matter these days, you could put yourself down as a pink rhino.

It will also apply to some cis women who have an F in their passport, humans are diverse and differences in sexual characteristics are a spectrum not an absolute binary. Generally I'm sure passport control officers see enough human variation not to throw a fit every time they see a woman with big feet, doesn't change the fact it's still generally easier and smoother for everyone if people's passports match their physical appearance. Unless you're proposing we force women with large feet to have an M in their passport just in case?

Mind you, in the actual passport M/F is shown under the heading "Sex/Sexe".

So some passports are providing officials with false information, since no human can change sex.

I mean, I'm all for a campaign to remove sex/gender information altogether from ID, it generally isn't relevant or necessary anyway

It's all nonsense, including the guidance and the excuses they are giving for the question. The current setup is NOT in line with the GRA, as they let people change it without having to have a GRC, but NOR is it really based on appearance, as they don't check your appearance before deciding what to put in the field, and anyway they couldn't mandate someone "looking like" whatever it said there all the time (loads of women, never mind people who identify as trans or "gender fluid" or whatever, dress in feminine ways sometimes and much more masculine at others! What about "Pips" Bunce for example, would he need two passports?!). Plus, the vast majority of men who say they're women, in particular, still look like men EVEN WHEN they're in a dress.

They basically changed it to pretty much self-ID, at the behest of trans activists - yes, you need a doctor's letter but they're easy enough to get, especially if happy to pay for it. So it's now a relatively useless field as you don't know whether it refers to someone's sex, appearance, how they like to be referred to (but some ppl may NOT have changed their passport even if they now "identify" as something else) or what. Well done HMPO and, of course, Stonewall, who no doubt influenced this via the Diversity Champions scheme, which (surprise, surprise) HMPO were part of...

Same. It’s no longer necessary.