Commentary on Sections Schedule 5 Part 1: Amendments to the Local Land Charges Act 1975
179.Section 3 of the LLCA 1975 provides for the existing local authorities in England and Wales to be the registering authorities for local land charges that affect land in their respective administrative areas and for them to maintain individual local land charges registers. Paragraph 3 replaces this with a new section 3 that provides for the Chief Land Registrar (CLR) to keep a single local land charges register and the intention is that the new register will be fully electronic. Such register is to comprise the local land charges registered in a local authority’s local land charges register immediately before the CLR becomes the registering authority for that authority’s administrative area and each local land charge that is subsequently registered in respect of land wholly or partly in that area.
180.Section 4 of the LLCA 1975 defines “appropriate local land charges register.” Paragraph 4 omits this section as it is unnecessary when the separate local authority local land charges registers administered by individual local authorities in England and Wales are replaced by a composite local land charges register for which the CLR will be responsible.
181.Section 5 of the LLCA 1975 deals with the registration of local land charges and defines “originating authorities” as those authorities by whom a local land charge is brought into existence or by whom, on its coming into existence, the charge is enforceable. Originating authorities include the local authorities that are also the registering authorities for local land charges affecting land in their respective administrative areas. Such authorities therefore effectively have a dual role where they are responsible for the origination of a local land charge. Section 5 of the LLCA 1975 requires a local authority that is both the originating authority and the registering authority to register the local land charge in the local land charges register for which it is responsible. In other cases, section 5 requires the originating authority for a local land charge to apply for its registration to the local authority that is the registering authority for the land affected by the charge. Paragraph 5 amends section 5 to require all originating authorities to apply to the CLR for registration of the local land charge where he or she has become the registering authority for the area in which the land affected by the charge is situated.
182.Paragraph 6 amends section 6 of the LLCA 1975 in relation to its application to general charges. General charges are charges that arise under certain conditions in favour of local authorities in advance of their being able to register a specific local land charge. Section 6 provides for the registration of general charges by the local authority that is the registering authority for the area in which the land affected by the general charge is situated. The provision is amended to require the CLR to register such charges on the application of the originating authority for the charge, where he or she has become the registering authority for the area in which the land affected by the general charge is situated.
183.Sections 8 and 9 of the LLCA 1975 provide for persons to be able to make personal searches of the existing local land charge registers for which local authorities in England and Wales are responsible as registering authorities and to requisition official searches of the register from the registering authorities. Paragraphs 7 and 8 amend sections 8 and 9 respectively so as to place the responsibility for providing personal search facilities and official searches results on the CLR where he or she has assumed responsibility for the registration of local land charges from any local authority.
184.Section 10 of the LLCA 1975 provides for a compensation scheme under which registering authorities are made responsible for compensating a purchaser of land that is subject to a local land charge for loss suffered by that person where that person has relied upon a personal or official search but the search has failed to disclose the existence of a local land charge that it should have disclosed. Paragraph 9 amends section 10 to place the responsibility for paying compensation to such a purchaser on the CLR in place of the relevant local authority where he or she has taken over responsibility from the local authority. Section 10 is also amended to include provision that entitles the CLR to recover from an originating authority any compensation he or she is required to pay to a purchaser as a consequence of an error by the originating authority. The CLR is also given power to insure against the risk of liability to pay compensation under section 10 by insertion of a new subsection (6A).
185.Section 14 of the LLCA 1975 provides for the Lord Chancellor, with the concurrence of the Treasury as to fees, to make rules for carrying the LLCA 1975 into effect. Revised rules will be required to give effect to the amended Act as it applies to the CLR when he or she assumes responsibility as the registering authority. Paragraph 13 provides for the inclusion of such additional enabling powers in section 14 as are required to allow rules to be made for this purpose. In particular, the additional powers include the making of rules—
	as to the variation of the registration of a local land charge without an order of the court on the application or with the consent of the person by whom it is enforceable, or of the Chief Land Registrar’s own motion,
	as to cancellation without an order of the court of the registration of a local land charge on its cesser or on the application or with the consent of the person by whom it is or was enforceable or of the Chief Land Registrar’s own motion.
186.It is the intention that the local land charges registration system administered by the CLR should be electronic and operate on the basis that applications to the CLR are received by electronic communications, in order to maximise the efficiency and speed with which the system operates.  Paragraph 13 therefore substitutes new paragraphs (b), (ba) and (bb) in subsection (2) of section 14 in place of the existing paragraph (b).  The purpose of the changes is to make it clear that the power to make rules under section 14(1) includes power to make rules as to the use of particular means of communication (such as electronic communication) that may or must be used for the purposes of the LLCA 1975 (such as making applications for the registration of local land charges and the making of personal or official searches of the register), the circumstances in which the particular means of communication is to be used and the form and contents of anything sent by that particular means of communication. It will also include power to make rules requiring or enabling anything provided to or by the CLR for the purposes of the LLCA 1975, or any other statutory provisions under which any matter is registrable in the local land charges register, to be provided in electronic form. The changes further provide that the details concerning the use of particular means of communication and anything which is provided to or by the CLR may be specified in the rules or determined by the CLR, or by a person who is providing services to the CLR, such as a third party provider of the computerised registration and communications systems that are envisaged (who will in practice operate in accordance with specifications determined by the CLR).
187.The effect of sub-paragraphs (4) to (6) of paragraph 13 of the Act is that the Lord Chancellor (with the concurrence of the Treasury) has power to set local land charges fees for England. The Welsh Ministers retain their current power to set local land charges fees in Wales.