Local Land Charges Act 1975

Definition of local land charges

Local land charges

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• (1) A charge or other matter affecting land is a local land charge if it falls within any of the following descriptions and is not one of the matters set out in section 2 below:—

• (a) any charge acquired either before or after the commencement of this Act by a local authority or National Park authority, water authority sewerage undertaker or new town development corporation under the Public Health Acts 1936 and 1937, . . . ,the Public Health Act 1961 or the Highways Act 1980 (or any Act repealed by that Act)or the Building Act 1984,or any similar charge acquired by a local authority or National Park authority under any other Act, whether passed before or after this Act, being a charge that is binding on successive owners of the land affected;

• (b) any prohibition of or restriction on the use of land—

• (i) imposed by a local authority or National Park authority on or after 1st January 1926 (including any prohibition or restriction embodied in any condition attached to a consent, approval or licence granted by a local authority or National Park authority on or after that date), or

• (ii) enforceable by a local authority or National Park authority under any covenant or agreement made with them on or after that date,

being a prohibition or restriction binding on successive owners of the land affected;

• (c) any prohibition of or restriction on the use of land—

• (i) imposed by a Minister of the Crown or government department on or after the date of the commencement of this Act (including any prohibition or restriction embodied in any condition attached to a consent, approval or licence granted by such a Minister or department on or after that date), or

• (ii) enforceable by such a Minister or department under any covenant or agreement made with him or them on or after that date,

being a prohibition or restriction binding on successive owners of the land affected;

• (d) any positive obligation affecting land enforceable by a Minister of the Crown, government department or local authority or National Park authority under any covenant or agreement made with him or them on or after the date of the commencement of this Act and binding on successive owners of the land affected;

• (e) any charge or other matter which is expressly made a local land charge by any statutory provision not contained in this section.

• (2) For the purposes of subsection (1)(a) above, any sum which is recoverable from successive owners or occupiers of the land in respect of which the sum is recoverable shall be treated as a charge, whether the sum is expressed to be a charge on the land or not.

• (3) For the purposes of this section and section 2 of this Act, the Broads Authority shall be treated as a local authority or National Park authority.

Matters which are not local land charges

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The following matters are not local land charges:—

• (a) a prohibition or restriction enforceable under a covenant or agreement made between a lessor and a lessee;

• (b) a positive obligation enforceable under a covenant or agreement made between a lessor and a lessee;

• (c) a prohibition or restriction enforceable by a Minister of the Crown, government department or local authority or National Park authority under any covenant or agreement, being a prohibition or restriction binding on successive owners of the land affected by reason of the fact that the covenant or agreement is made for the benefit of land of the Minister, government department or local authority or National Park authority;

• (d) a prohibition or restriction embodied in any bye-laws;

• (e) a condition or limitation subject to which planning permission was granted at any time before the commencement of this Act or was or is (at any time) deemed to be granted under any statutory provision relating to town and country planning, whether by a Minister of the Crown, government department or local authority or National Park authority;

• (f) a prohibition or restriction embodied in a scheme under the Town and Country Planning Act 1932 or any enactment repealed by that Act;

• (g) a prohibition or restriction enforceable under a forestry dedication covenant entered into pursuant to section 5 of the Forestry Act 1967;

• (h) a prohibition or restriction affecting the whole of any of the following areas:—

• (i) England, Wales or England and Wales;

• (ii) England, or England and Wales, with the exception of, or of any part of, Greater London;

• (iii) Greater London.

Local land charges register, registration and related matters

Registering authorities, local land charges registers, and indexes

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• (1) The Chief Land Registrar must keep the local land charges register.

• (2) The local land charges register is a register of—

• (a) each local land charge registered in a local land charges register for a local authority's area immediately before this section first had effect in relation to that area, and

• (b) each local land charge subsequently registered under section 5 or 6 or another relevant enactment in respect of land which is wholly or partly within that area.

• (3) Subsection (2) is subject to any later variation or cancellation of the registration of the local land charge.

• (4) The local land charges register may be kept in electronic form.

• (5) In this section—

• “ local authority ” means— a district council,a county council in England for an area for which there is no district council,a county council in Wales,a county borough council,a London borough council,the Common Council of the City of London, orthe Council of the Isles of Scilly;

• “ relevant enactment ” means a provision which is made by or under an Act and which provides for the registration of a charge or other matter as a local land charge.

• (6) For the purposes of this section the area of the Common Council of the City of London includes the Inner Temple and the Middle Temple.

The appropriate local land charges register

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Registration

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• (1) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

• (2) Subject to subsection (6) below, the originating authority as respects a local land charge must apply to the Chief Land Registrar for its registration in the local land charges register; and on the application being made the Chief Land Registrar must register the charge accordingly.

• (3) The registration in the local land charges register of a local land charge, or of any matter which when registered becomes a local land charge, must be carried out by reference to the land affected.

• (4) In this Act, “the originating authority”, as respects a local land charge, means the Minister of the Crown, government department, local authority or other person by whom the charge is brought into existence or by whom, on its coming into existence, the charge is enforceable; and for this purpose—

• (a) where a matter that is a local land charge consists of or is embodied in, or is otherwise given effect by, an order, scheme or other instrument made or confirmed by a Minister of the Crown or government department on the application of another authority the charge shall be treated as brought into existence by that other authority; and

• (b) a local land charge brought into existence by a Minister of the Crown or government department on an appeal from a decision or determination of another authority or in the exercise of powers ordinarily exercisable by another authority shall be treated as brought into existence by that other authority.

• (5) The registration of a local land charge may be cancelled pursuant to an order of the court.

• (6) Where a charge or other matter is registrable in the local land charges register and before the commencement of this Act was also registrable in a register kept under the Land Charges Act 1972, then, if before the commencement of this Act it was registered in a register kept under that Act, there shall be no duty to register it, or to apply for its registration, under this Act and section 10 below shall not apply in relation to it.

Local authority's right to register a general charge against land in certain circumstances

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• (1) Where a local authority have incurred any expediture in respect of which, when any relevant work is completed and any requisite resolution is passed or order is made, there will arise in their favour a local land charge (in this section referred to as “the specific charge”), the following provisions of this section shall apply.

• (2) At any time before the specific charge comes into existence, the Chief Land Registrar must register a general charge against the land, without any amount being specified, in the local land charges register if the originating authority make an application for that purpose.

• (3) A general charge registered under this section shall be a local land charge, but section 5(2) above shall not apply in relation to such a charge.

• (4) If a general charge is registered under this section the originating authority shall, when the specific charge comes into existence, notify the Chief Land Registrar of that fact, and any such notification shall be treated as an application (subject to subsection (5) below) for the cancellation of the general charge and the registration of the specific charge.

• (5) Where a general charge is registered under this section its registration shall be cancelled within such period starting with the day on which the specific charge comes into existence, and not being less than 1 year, as may be prescribed, and the specific charge shall not be registered before the general charge is cancelled.

• (6) If the registration of the general charge is duly cancelled within the period specified in subsection (5) above and the specific charge is registered forthwith upon the cancellation or was discharged before the cancellation, then, for the purposes of section 10 below, the specific charge shall be treated as having come into existence at the time when the general charge was cancelled.

Effect of registering certain financial charges

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A local land charge falling within section 1(1)(a) above shall, when registered, take effect as if it had been created by a deed of charge by way of legal mortgage within the meaning of the Law of Property Act 1925, but without prejudice to the priority of the charge.

Searches

Personal searches

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• (1) Any person may search in the local land charges register on paying the prescribed fee (if any).

• (1A) If the local land charges register is kept in electronic form, the entitlement of a person to search in it is satisfied if the Chief Land Registrar makes the portion of it which he wishes to examine available for inspection in visible and legible form.

• (2) Without prejudice to subsections (1) and (1A) above, the Chief Land Registrar may provide facilities for enabling persons entitled to search in the ... local land charges register to see photographic or other images or copies of any portion of the register which they may wish to examine.

Official searches

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• (1) Where any person requires an official search of the ... local land charges register to be made in respect of any land, he may make a requisition in that behalf to the Chief Land Registrar .

• (2) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

• (3) The prescribed fee (if any) shall be payable in the prescribed manner in respect of any requisition made under this section.

• (4) Where a requisition is made to the Chief Land Registrar under this section and the fee (if any) payable in respect of it is paid in accordance with subsection (3) ... above, the Chief Land Registrar shall thereupon make the search required and shall issue an official certificate setting out the result of the search.

Compensation for non-registration or defective official search certificate

Compensation for non-registration or defective official search certificate

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• (1) Failure to register a local land charge in the ... local land charges register shall not affect the enforceability of the charge but where a person has purchased any land affected by a local land charge, then—

• (a) in a case where a material personal search of the ... local land charges register was made in respect of the land in question before the relevant time, if at the time of the search the charge was in existence but not registered in that register; or

• (aa) if the ... local land charges register is kept in electronic form and a material personal search of that register was made in respect of the land in question before the relevant time, if the entitlement to search in that register conferred by section 8 above was not satisfied as mentioned in subsection (1A) of that section; or

• (b) in a case where a material official search of the ... local land charges register was made in respect of the land in question before the relevant time, if the charge was in existence at the time of the search but (whether registered or not) was not shown by the official search certificate as registered in that register,

the purchaser shall (subject to section 11(1) below) be entitled to compensation for any loss suffered by him in consequence.

• (2) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

• (3) For the purposes of this section—

• (a) a person purchases land where, for valuable consideration, he acquires any interest in land or the proceeds of sale of land, and this includes cases where he acquires as lessee or mortgagee and shall be treated as including cases where an interest is conveyed or assigned at his direction to another person;

• (b) the relevant time—

• (i) where the acquisition of the interest in question was preceded by a contract for its acquisition, other than a qualified liability contract, is the time when that contract was made;

• (ii) in any other case, is the time when the purchaser acquired the interest in question or, if he acquired it under a disposition which took effect only when registered in the register of title kept under the Land Registration Act 2002 , the time when that disposition was made;

and for the purposes of sub-paragraph (i) above, a qualified liability contract is a contract containing a term the effect of which is to make the liability of the purchaser dependent upon, or avoidable by reference to, the outcome of a search for local land charges affecting the land to be purchased.

• (c) a personal search is material if, but only if—

• (i) it is made after the commencement of this Act, and

• (ii) it is made by or on behalf of the purchaser or, before the relevant time, the purchaser or his agent has knowledge of the result of it;

• (d) an official search is material if, but only if—

• (i) it is made after the commencement of this Act, and

• (ii) it is requisitioned by or on behalf of the purchaser or, before the relevant time, the purchaser or his agent has knowledge of the contents of the official search certificate.

• (4) Any compensation for loss under this section shall be paid by the Chief Land Registrar ; and where the purchaser has incurred expenditure for the purpose of obtaining compensation under this section, the amount of the compensation shall include the amount of the expenditure reasonably incurred by him for that purpose (so far as that expenditure would not otherwise fall to be treated as loss for which he is entitled to compensation under this section).

• (5) Where any compensation for loss under this section is paid by the Chief Land Registrar , then, unless an application for registration of the charge was made to the Chief Land Registrar by the originating authority in time for it to be practicable for the Chief Land Registrar to avoid incurring liability to pay that compensation, an amount equal thereto shall be recoverable from the originating authority by the Chief Land Registrar .

• (5A) An amount equal to any compensation paid under this section by the Chief Land Registrar in respect of a local land charge is also recoverable from the originating authority in a case where the matter within subsection (1) giving rise to the Chief Land Registrar's liability is a consequence of—

• (a) an error made by the originating authority in applying to register the local land charge, or

• (b) an error made by the originating authority in applying for the registration of the local land charge to be varied or cancelled.

• (6) Where any compensation for loss under this section is paid by the Chief Land Registrar , no part of the amount paid, or of any corresponding amount paid to the Chief Land Registrar by the originating authority under subsection (5) or (5A) above, shall be recoverable by the Chief Land Registrar or the originating authority from any other person except as provided by subsection (5) or (5A) above or under a policy of insurance or on grounds of fraud.

• (6A) The Chief Land Registrar may insure against the risk of liability to pay compensation under this section.

• (7) In the case of an action to recover compensation under this section the cause of action shall be deemed for the purposes of the Limitation Act 1980 to accrue at the time when the local land charge comes to the notice of the purchaser; and for the purposes of this subsection the question when the charge came to his notice shall be determined without regard to the provisions of section 198 of the Law of Property Act 1925 (under which registration under certain enactments is deemed to constitute actual notice).

• (8) Where the amount claimed by way of compensation under this section does not exceed £5,000, proceedings for the recovery of such compensation may be begun in the county court .

• (9) If in any proceedings for the recovery of compensation under this section the court dismisses a claim to compensation, it shall not order the purchaser to pay the Chief Land Registrar's costs unless it considers that it was unreasonable for the purchaser to commence the proceedings.

Mortgages, trusts for sale and settled land

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• (1) Where there appear to be grounds for a claim under section 10 above in respect of an interest that is subject to a mortgage—