Ministers shelve Land Registry sale but local land charges transfer survives

The Government has shelved plans to privatise the Land Registry as the organisation goes through a period of major transformation.

Then business minister Michael Fallon told Parliament on Monday that more time was needed to decide whether to sell the operation given it was undergoing “a complete change both in the way that the business is operated and managed, and in its IT architecture”.

He said: “Given the importance of the Land Registry to the effective operation of the UK property market, we have concluded that further consideration would be valuable. Therefore, at this time, no decision has been taken to change Land Registry’s model.”

But he said this did not affected proposals in the Infrastructure Bill to centralise local land charge searches in the Registry, stripping local authorities of this task.

The Local Government Association has called for the plans to be halted pending a review. It argued that centralisation of searches would deprive councils of income and was contrary to localism.

Mark Smulian