PART 10  LAND REGISTRY

CLAUSE 99   CONDUCT OF BUSINESS

83. Clause 99 deals with the effective conduct of the functions conferred on the registrar by the Bill. The clause delegates power to the Lord Chancellor to make regulations governing the carrying out of the registrar's functions whilst there is a vacancy in the office of registrar. It also provides that the Lord Chancellor may by order designate the particular office responsible for receiving particular applications, to permit, for example, particularly large development schemes involving land allocated to a number of district registries to be handled as a single operation in just one of them. These are matters of good internal registry procedure, and are currently dealt with by regulation and order ensuring flexibility in the conduct of the day to day work of the registry. An order made under clause 99(3) designating offices is not subject to the negative procedure but merely has to be laid before Parliament after being made (see clause 125(3) (d) and (4) (b)).

CLAUSE 101    FEE ORDERS

84. Clause 101 gives the Lord Chancellor power, with the assistance of the Rule Committee, and the consent of the Treasury, to prescribe fees for dealing with the Land Registry, and for the payment of those fees. This replicates the position under the existing framework. Fees in respect of optional advisory or consultancy services are, however, left to the registrar to determine. Fee orders are made normally once or twice a year in order to adjust the fee income to match Land Registry expenditure and are subject to Treasury scrutiny. As under the current system, a fees order under the Bill is not subject to any Parliamentary procedure (see clause 125(4)(b)).