adamsilver
commented
5 years ago From Chris N:
We did this on divorce. I think it was legacy on the divorce project. I'd recommend contacting Neil McWhinnie. He's the content designer and can give you more background.
Basically it's a common pattern elsewhere (eg. booking flights) where you want to ask for their name (first and surname) but also want middle names if appropriate. We needed them on divorce because the court compares their full name (inc. middle names) with their marriage cert and expect them to match. I'd expect a similar pattern for passenger information on a flight where you need exact match for passport information. So I'm not saying it's a perfect pattern, but it works well if you do need middle names, otherwise I'd drop the hint-text. Spanish people often use two surnames: José Antonio Gómez Iglesias for instance. That would be José Antonio in the first names field and Gómez Iglesias in the surnames field.
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_naming_customs
I think this is covered in the GOV.UK Design System.
It was done with first name(s) and last name(s) for historical reasons. Now should just ask for full name.
I believe our guidance is now redundant given the GOV.UK Design System matches our own guidance.
I suggest we remove .our version.