Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what assessment her Department has made of the potential merits of adding time left on an individual's old passport onto their new one.

The UK was the last country to carry over validity from a previous passport, with the maximum validity carried over on renewal being up to nine months. However, the international guidelines for passports state a passport should be valid for a maximum of 10 years, and a passport for a child should be issued for a maximum of five years.

As part of its work to prepare for all eventualities ahead of the UK leaving the European Union, Her Majesty’s Passport Office determined, for third-country nationals travelling to most countries in Europe, any period of validity of a passport older than 10 years may not be accepted. This highlighted the potential for confusion to passport holders about validity dates if the validity period was not set in line with the international guidelines.

Additional validity therefore ceased to be carried over from a previous passport since 10 September 2018, and there are currently no plans to re-introduce this policy