The Law Reform Commission (LRC) has recommended a major overhaul of the Compulsory Purchase Order (CPO) system following a review of the current procedures.
The independent statutory body has today (Wednesday, March 29) published a report which includes a draft bill, titled ‘the Acquisition of Land Bill 2023‘.
The commission said that its key objective is to introduce a simplified system of acquisition and compensation that fairly balances the rights of landowners and the acquiring authorities’ requirement to quickly and efficiently acquire land so that projects can be progressed.
The report deals solely with reforms in the compulsory acquisition system after the CPO has been confirmed and becomes operative.
Due to the government’s revision of the Planning and Development Bill, which would include provisions for CPOs up to the confirmation stage, the commission’s review focused on the activation and compensation processes.
Law Reform Commission
There are numerous pieces of legislation governing acquisition of land and payment of compensation, some of which date back as far as 1845.
Currently, once the compulsory purchase order is confirmed the land is acquired by the use of a notice to treat.
The Law Reform Commission identified multiple shortcomings in this procedure, including:
- There is no time limit within which an acquiring authority must serve a notice of entry, following service of a notice to treat;
- Where a notice of entry is served, the period in which the acquiring authority may enter possession is not limited;
- No compensation is payable at the time when the owner loses possession, but only when compensation is determined (although interest is payable on the compensation sum from the date of possession by the acquiring authority).
The report recommends that the notice to treat procedure should be scrapped entirely and replaced with a new “vesting order procedure” outlined in the draft bill.
This new procedure would require the acquiring authority to proceed with a CPO in a timely manner.
An acquiring authority would have 12 months from the date the compulsory order becomes operative to decide whether it wishes to proceed with the acquisition. If it does not proceed within that period, the compulsory order will lapse.
Landowners would have to be given three months’ notice to arrange their affairs once the authority decides to proceed with the acquisition.
The acquiring authority must also ensure that the vesting order takes place no later than six months from the date it is served.
CPO
The new procedure would allow acquiring authorities to get the title to the land at an earlier stage.
Under the current system the authority would not get ownership of the land until compensation is determined and agreed and the owner proves their title.
The commission recommends that an acquiring authority should make an advance payment of no less than 90% of the estimated compensation at, or near, the time the owner loses title to their land.
This means that owners will receive a substantial sum of money before they lose possession of their land.
The report also said that there should be substantial reform of the system to deal with disputes regarding the amount of compensation.
The LRC said the current mechanism involving a property arbitrator should be replaced with a permanent statutory body with expertise in land valuation.
The commission said that the Valuation Tribunal would be a suitable body to carry out this function.
Decisions would be delivered within six months from the date of an application being made and reasoned decisions would be published on the tribunal’s website.