There is a real threat to the property market says CoPSO Chairman James Sherwood-Rogers
The Council of Property Search Organisations (CoPSO) has today called on Vince Cable to intervene in the very controversial move by the Land Registry to centralise the Local land Charges Registers from Local Authorities. These registers contain vital information for prospective homebuyers including planning applications, listed buildings status, tree preservation orders, enforcement notices and a lot of other vital data.
CoPSO understands that Mr Cable intervened in respect of plans to move towards privatisation of the Land Registry and CoPSO believe he should do the same in respect of Local Land Charges.
The present provision of local searches for conveyancing lawyers sees healthy competition between local authorities and private sector search companies and a massive 91% of respondents to the Land Registry consultation on their centralisation plans voted to maintain the status quo. The legal community simply has no appetite for this needless change.
James Sherwood-Rogers, the Chairman of CoPSO said: “the Land Registry’s attempt at a data grab from Local Authorities is totally unnecessary and poses a real threat to the property market. Already some local land charges officers are voting with their feet and search turnaround times are ballooning in some locations due to the crass handling of this initiative by Land Registry officials. The real concern however comes when the Land Registry attempts to centralise the data. Their previous attempts at projects outside their remit have failed spectacularly at a cost of £87million to the tax payer. If this one fails however it is more than taxpayers’ money that is at stake, it is the whole operation of the property market.”
The Land Registry has claimed that this initiative is part of the Government’s ‘digital by default’ imperative, but some 83% of local authorities already hold the data in electronic format, and it would be a lot easier and much less expensive to simply mop up the other 17%.
Sherwood-Rogers added: “this seems more about ‘digital at any cost’ rather than ‘digital by default’ simply to meet the expansionary ambitions of the Land Registry. They should stick to the knitting which they do well and for which they have the deserved respect of the legal community. Mr Cable could protect the property market and the tax payer by intervening in this senseless project”
