Law Commission consultation on compulsory purchase

We provisionally propose that an acquiring authority, when it serves a notice to treat, must have made a clear decision to proceed with the purchase of the subject land. A corollary of this is that, where an acquiring authority has not made such a decision, it may not serve a notice to treat merely to extend its power to compulsorily acquire land beyond the initial time limit for implementation.

Do consultees agree?

We provisionally propose that:

1. the currently alternative procedures for implementing a compulsory purchase order (notice to treat and the general vesting declaration) should be replaced by a single unified procedure; and
2. the single unified procedure should be based on the more modern general vesting declaration procedure, with suitable modifications.

(Consultation Question 17 below asks about what modifications are suitable).

Do consultees agree?

We invite views from consultees on whether the unified single procedure which we propose above should contain suitable modifications aiming to retain the flexibility and other features currently driving the use of the notice to treat procedure in a minority of acquisitions. In particular, some options include:

1. having a vesting period of anywhere between three months and three years after the execution of a general vesting declaration to mirror the three-year default expiry period of a notice to treat;
2. permitting acquiring authorities to bring forward the vesting date, by agreement with the landowner (as section 8A of the Compulsory Purchase (Vesting Declarations) Act 1981 currently only permits the date to be postponed by agreement);
3. introducing an alternative statutory notice procedure to acquire minor or long tenancies which are about to expire, replicating the effect of section 9(2) of the Compulsory Purchase (Vesting Declarations) Act 1981;
4. commencing the temporary possession provisions in sections 18 to 31 of the Neighbourhood Planning Act 2017 either generally or to the extent that they relate to the implementation of CPOs; and
5. making provision for the withdrawal of a general vesting declaration, applying some or all of the provisions in section 31 of the Land Compensation Act 1961 that apply to notices to treat.

We welcome consultees’ views on these, or any other options for retaining the flexibility driving the use of the notice to treat procedure in a minority of acquisitions.