The Gazette 1983

GAZETTE

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 1983

The Consequences

The effect of these Sections of the 1964 Act was to

require that where land, including rents, whether

supported by a right of ejectment or not, and rent

charges, has been sold under the 1869 Act by the

Commissioners for Church Temporalities or the

Land Commission, the title to that land is compul-

sorily registerable in the Land Registry. The test to

be applied to conveyances on or after the Operative

Date is:—

was the land at any time sold and conveyed to or

vested in any person in pursuance of the Act

and, if so, has any conveyance on sale taken

place since the 1st January 1967?

If the answer to both limbs of this test is in the

affirmative, then the title to the property should be

registered forthwith.

The best way of seeing the consequences of this

legislation is by looking at the various types of

property which could be sold by the Church

Temporalities Commissioners or, after 1881, by the

Land Commission.

Church Lands Reacquired

Many of the assets which the Church of Ireland

was empowered to reacquire continue to be used by

that Church down to the present and, although the

RCB as a statutory body is required under Section 23

(l)(b) and Section 25 of the 1964 Act to register any

property which it has acquired

since the Operative

Data within six months of acquisition, assets

acquired before that date are not compulsorily

registerable, since Section 51 of the 1927 Act appears

never to have applied to such land. A property sold by

the RCB since the Operative Date, which was vested

in it on disestablishment and the title to which is

unregistered, has a good title but no interest will vest

in the purchaser unless the title is registered by him

within six months of the closing of the sale. If the

property was conveyed by the RCB before the

Operative Date, the interest will have vested in the

purchaser but, on being conveyed by that purchaser

or a subsequent purchaser after the Operative Date,

the property is registerable by any purchaser after 1st

January 1967.

Tenanted Land

Where a tenant of ecclesiastical land purchased his

freehold under the Irish Church Act 1869 from the

Church Temporalities Commissioners or the Land

Commission, the situation is complex and technical,

but it is important as it may determine whether or not

a vendor or a purchaser must be responsible for the

registration and, thereby, for the costs and delays

involved in registration. The analysis must be carried

out by reference to the date of the conveyance and the

method by which the sale under the Irish Church Act

took place:-

1. Cash Sales by the Commissioners

The registration of the title to such land was

voluntary until 1927. From 1927 until 1st January

1967, registration was compulsory but no method of

enforcing registration appears to have been available.

Since 1st January 1967, the title to such land became

registerable within six months of the land being

conveyed on a sale.

2. Sales by the Commissioners, with part of the

purchase money secured on a mortgage.

So long as money was secured, the title to the land

was compulsorily registerable and the Land

Commission could enforce registration under the

1891 Act. If the land was sold subject to the charge at

any time before 1st January 1967, the title was

registerable forthwith. Since 1st January 1967, it is

registerable within six months of a conveyance sale.

Once the charge had been paid off, then, provided

that there had been no conveyance of the property

during the period of the charge, the title to the land

was not registerable until 1927. From 1927 until 31st

December 1966, the title to the land would be

registerable but no enforcement procedures appear

to have been available. Since 1st January 1967, the

title to the land is registerable within six months of a

conveyance on sale.

Rent Charges and Fee Farm Rents

To turn to rent charges, the purchase under the

Irish Church Act of an ecclesiastical tithe rent charge

created under the Tithe Rent Charge Act of 1838,

wh e t h e r f r om t he Ch u r ch T emp o r a l i t i es

Commissioners, in the past, or from their successors

the Land Commission, at any time, will, following

the decision in

In re Reeves Estate

, give rise to a

requirement that the title to the entire freehold

interest in the land should be registered and not just

the title to the rent charge. The tithe rent charge is an

incorporeal hereditament but, as such, it is "land" as

defined by the 1964 Act. Likewise, the purchase

under the Irish Church Act 1869 of a Fee Farm rent

created under the Church Temporalities Act 1833

will give rise to compulsory registration. Such

rents, being supported by rights of ejectment or

distress, are corporeal in character and therefore

"land" within the definitions in both the 1891 and

1964 Acts.

The foregoing analysis of the occasions on which

registration is required in respect of tenanted land is

applicable to the situation created by the purchase of

a rent charge or fee farm rent under the Irish Church

Act. Redemption of the rent charge or fee farm rent

may have taken place very recently. Some convey-

ancers do not call for a conveyance or release from the

Land Commission, but it is not clear whether or not

payment of the purchase money will trigger the

registration requirement. The better opinion would

appear to be that it will not.

Care must be taken to draw a distinction between

an Ecclesiastical Commissioners' fee farm grant,

which is not registerable in the Land Registry

per se

and a Church Temporalities Commissioners'

conveyance or a conveyance from the Land

Commission, which is; e.g. a release of the rent under

an Ecclesiastical Commissioners' fee farm grant. An

Ecclesiastical Commissioners' fee farm grant was

entered into in pursuance of a policy designed to

release land and conveyancing from the burden of a

succession of short leases, while the Church Tempor-