I don't deal with the CAA so please forgive my ignorance........
Going "back to birth" is not really compatible with "as far as one can" - one or the other. There are many, older aircraft around that don't have all logs from new. It was often the case, with imports, that foreign logbooks were spirited off never to be seen again. How far does the discretion of the ARC issuer stretch?
Presumably the paperwork from the original ARC issuance becomes part of the paperwork history belonging to the aircraft (the owner paid for it after all) - so subsequent ARC processes can simply refer back to a list of SBs, ADs and modifications in an easy-to-check format?