Who The Rainbow Project is#
The Rainbow Project has been on the Northern Ireland charity register since 2014. Its register entry describes work to improve the health and wellbeing of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in Northern Ireland through research, advocacy, information and education, and lists the people it helps, from young people aged 14 to 25 to parents, people with HIV and victims of crime. Its trans and non-binary resources page is gentle about the early stage: many people try out different names and pronouns before settling, and there is no rush to set one in stone.
How to contact it#
The contact page has an enquiry form, and says the office is open from 10am to 5pm on weekdays. The name change page itself invites people to get in touch for support or advice, particularly about changes for under-18s.
What its page says about changing your name#
The page "Changing your name: deed poll" is written for readers in Northern Ireland, and it sets out two routes for adults:
- A change recorded with the General Register Office for Northern Ireland (GRONI), which the page calls an unenrolled deed poll. You fill in GRONI's adult application form, have it witnessed by a Justice of the Peace, lay magistrate or practising solicitor, and send it with a certified copy of your birth certificate and the fee. It quotes the limits: one change of forename, and up to three changes of surname with five years between each.
- An enrolled deed poll through the Royal Courts of Justice, which puts the change on public record with a notice in the London Gazette. It lists the documents it understood to be needed, including a statutory declaration from someone who has known you for at least ten years, and a fee of £42.44.
For under-18s it says an unenrolled deed poll can be made through a solicitor or a specialist deed poll agency, that young people aged 16 or over can make the application themselves, and that enrolment needs the agreement of everyone with parental responsibility.
Are the fees and forms still current?#
nidirect, the Northern Ireland government's site, confirms GRONI's witnesses, limits and fee: £35 to record the change, plus £15 for a certificate showing it, which matches the page's £50 for both. nidirect calls this recording a change of name, and it is open only to people born or adopted in Northern Ireland.
For enrolment, GOV.UK now lists the fee as £53.05 and describes an online or postal application on forms LOC020, LOC021 and LOC027, with two witnesses for the deed and a solicitor for the other forms. It publishes your name change and your address in The Gazette, though a judge may agree to publish only your first name or surname if you give a strong reason.
Neither route is needed for an ordinary deed poll. GOV.UK's free wording works for anyone aged 16 or over, wherever they were born, and HM Passport Office's evidence rules are the same across the UK. Driving licences in Northern Ireland are issued by the DVA, not DVLA.
Northern Ireland in the handbook#
- Changing your name in Northern Ireland: the GRONI record and the deed poll compared.
- Changing a child's name in Northern Ireland: who must sign for a child.
- How to enrol a deed poll: the current forms and what is published.
- Changing your name with the DVA: licences in Northern Ireland.
This page describes what The Rainbow Project publishes on its own website, read on 26 October 2026. The Rainbow Project has not reviewed it, and listing a charity here does not mean it recommends this handbook or any deed poll service.
