John Dingle and Edward Williams, in our Commercial Property team, discuss the government's consultation in relation to proposed regulations to improve the transparency of land ownership in England and Wales and the potential impact of any proposals.
The government launched an eight week consultation in January 2024 in relation to proposed regulations to improve the transparency of land ownership in England and Wales pursuant to Part 11 of the Levelling Up and Regeneration Act. The basis of the consultation is to seek views on government plans to “provide greater transparency on contractual control agreements.” Contractual control agreements are defined as agreements such as “option agreements, that are used to control land short of outright ownership” and would also include conditional contracts, promotion agreements, pre-emption agreements, and the like.
The rationale behind the proposals is the improvement of accessibility to information as to who owns/controls land. That would, on the face of it, produce a clearer and more transparent system, in turn helping to promote land development. Whilst the proposed measures would increase transparency, is there a danger too that the government’s proposals may have some drawbacks?
The potential benefits seem well-intentioned. A freely accessible database would help identify potential sites for development, and therefore assist promoters, land agents, developers, and other such parties. The proposal could also act as an incentive to any “land bankers” to bring a site forward in the knowledge that details of their agreement with the landowner are more widely known.
On the other hand, there may be some downsides to the proposals.
Freely available data may in fact act to hinder development. Local opposition will learn of development plans more easily, and far earlier than might be typical. Opposition arising even at the most junior stages of a development would inevitably insert another hurdle and may outweigh the proposed removal of the drags and blocks on development to which the consultation refers. Landowners might be more reluctant to bring land forward for development due to concerns about earlier and longer community opposition.
It is questionable too whether another database would be useful. Much of the proposed information is already publicly available through the Land Registry, via planning registers, and other sources, avenues which developers, promoters and land agents will already be able to access when undertaking their due diligence. The general public would undoubtedly find that access to the information has become more readily and easily available but see again the comments above.
An initial concern for most contracting parties would be that commercially sensitive information may become available. The consultation does state that there is no intention to publish the underlying agreement, but the publication of information about a site, including the extent of the site, the parties to the relevant agreement, and the length of the agreement, may extend to information that is too sensitive for some and may again foster landowner reluctance to put land forward. Whilst the consultation does not expressly refer to land value or price at the moment, a requirement to disclose price mechanisms would be extremely sensitive. On the other hand, a paucity of information would possibly bear little use.
Given the costs associated with land and the promotion and development of it, very few will acquire a site with the intention of not bringing it forwards as soon as is reasonably possible. One of the major obstacles for developers is the under-resourced and increasingly complex planning system, which has been hindered and slowed with government tinkering to the system over many years, and these proposals will do nothing to tackle perhaps the largest single obstacle to the time it takes to bring a development site to fruition.
The outcome of this consultation will be awaited with interest. In theory, free access to information as to ownership and control seems welcome on some levels, but will not be without its consequences and continuing hurdles.
For further information or legal advice, please contact law@blandy.co.uk or call 0118 951 6800.
This article is intended for the use of clients and other interested parties. The information contained in it is believed to be correct at the date of publication, but it is necessarily of a brief and general nature and should not be relied upon as a substitute for specific professional advice.
