The Legislative Council has decided on an outline for revision of the Family Register Law to set criteria on phonetic readings of names, to be written in kana characters, in family registers. The advisory panel to the justice minister presented the outlines to Justice Minister Ken Saito on Friday.
Currently, family registers do not have a field to indicate phonetic readings. After the law revision, family registers will include phonetic readings of kanji in kana characters.
According to the outlines, certain restrictions will be set on "colorful names" whose phonetic readings in kana characters deviate from the original meanings of the kanji characters.
