Another aspect of the passport application rules which makes no sense to me >

Who cannot confirm someone’s identity

You cannot confirm someone’s identity if:

• you’re related by birth or marriage <=Who the heck else is better suited to prove your identity?!
  
• you’re in a relationship with them or live together
  
• you work for HM Passport Office
  
• you work for UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) on British citizenship or right of abode applications
  
• you’re a doctor - unless you know the person who has asked you well (for example, you’re a good friend)""
  

Well supposing there is information in a passport since its issue that has not found its way to the electronic records on the other side of the world?
You don't think travel is relevant to a travel document? Are you sure you're thinking about this properly?

I think you'd be right about using an out of date passport but I would suggest a genuine passport with it's design and security features might be of more use to someone less legally inclined.

Ah, I get it. You're not serious about this.

I mean, a relative just wouldn't go along with a potential deception...it just wouldn't happen, would it. Oh no.

As I said, IMHO this is a facile rule which only inconveniences honest applicants:
I don't believe passport office do check travel history(?) I would suggest they do not have the resources, time or inclination to manually check all applicants travel history before approving passport applications.
Those who have something to hide could simply claim their passport is lost.

Most parents will (as I did) apply for passports for their children before they are 18. Why on earth should they be barred from confirming identity after 18?
I do not agree, I believe most relatives would refuse to "go along with a potential deception".
My suggestion is that savvy criminals can easily circumvent the process and these facile rules merely inconvenience honest applicants.

Perhaps not all and perhaps not in great detail. Possibly a random check like so many other things are a random check. But where a passport does have something in, it does at least enable them to check if it matches or indeed has something where they have nothing.
Similarly, if no passport is included in the application then they have zero opportunity to check.

So little opportunity to check or no opportunity to check. Is that good practice?

Your last line about falsely claiming a lost passport makes zero sense. It will be investigated. You think someone with something to hide wants an investigation? You really aren't thinking it through.

But what about the rest? If your concern is a criminal one why would you favour something that allows a deception in some cases rather than none?
How do you think criminals get to be savvy without - in this case - examination of genuine passports?
I'm guessing you have no idea of passport security features. I attended an awareness session on fake passports about 30 years ago. Did you know, for example, that some of the underlining in a passport is not actually underlining but letters and numbers that you need special equipment to read? Stitching done in a particular way that won't be obvious to a casual observer.

I can't even imagine what modern features they will have now and you can bet that there will be ways of quickly identifying discrepancies that the untrained eye won't have a clue about.

Correct me if I'm wrong but all British nationals born overseas have the option ("opportunity") of registering their birth abroad with UK authorities, which then means that data is stored with the General Register Office who can issue you a birth certificate locally.

Wow, that is truly something! I've never heard of a NATO BC before.

Come to think of it it is the ULTIMATE anti-identity-theft method possible: send in your old passport to receive a new one. You literally cannot beat that.

My point is some of the rules are facile and do not deter criminals, merely inconvenience honest people.

I did apply when my passport was "lost". I had it in my pocket when I washed my trousers. No questions were asked and AFIK no investigation was carried out.
In contrast: When my wife lost her hearing aid, she had to provide a Police report, before insurers would honour her claim.

For your info: Electronic passports with a biometric chip were introduced in 2006, only after the USA demanded it.

"Come to think of it it is the ULTIMATE anti-identity-theft method possible: send in your old passport to receive a new one. You literally cannot beat that. "
If government must treat everyone as criminals they could require a deposit to ensure old is returned AFTER new is issued. IF they wanted to carry out checks, they could easily cancel any passport where they identified an issue. This would be a more helpful rule for honest people.

Not having a passport for a couple of weeks every ten years is not particularly an inconvenience for me. The amount of times I've had an emergency whereby I need the passport to fly or go to a foreign country or for ID in the last thirty years is zero. Even if it takes four weeks it's still only 0.75% of the amount of time it is in my possession.
Maybe I'm just lucky and others have had more incidents of it than me.

She is the only person i know that has one and i served in the RAF myself for 22 years. Mind we are talking about a while back 1958 and her father at the time was posted to a NATO HQ place in France so that maybe why they got the NATO one ?

Still a remarkable story to have all three, especially the NATO one. Was the British one done by the "register a child birth abroad" method? I got those for my daughters so that their records are now also held in the UK in case of any future geopolitical trouble...

Sorry I have no idea under what system or where her UK BC was registered.

Maybe but it was just included in the Forces record, some two years after her birth.
You have to go to the overseas births records and find the book, page and line number, which I printed as its been asked for many times.
Apparently there are discrepancies in the record (it states she is Male and her name is spelt differently as her father spelt it wrong).
We have never bothered with a UK one as the Kenyan one has always been accepted, even here in Spain.

It didn't help that her parents moved countries four or five times and her brother was born in Cyprus (he however has a British Birth cert).
To add more complications we were married in Barbados, so very little of our paperwork (except boring old me) is normal.

As to the questions about sending the old UK passport in. It would seem that the Office requires it to process the application.
This is the email message I have just received.