STATUTES
| Published date | 01 May 1976 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.1976.tb01459.x |
| Date | 01 May 1976 |
STATUTES
THE
COMMUNITY
LAND
ACT 1975
Aims
of
the
legisla#ion
“We wish the baby, happy stay.” read an announcement in a
Nigerian newspaper recently.
No
such good wishes greeted the unhappy
infant which came into the world
as
the Community Land Bill and
later, battered, mewling and puking. lay in the arms of its begetters
as the Community Land Act 1975. As the Opposition has already
promised death at the earliest opportunity the child seems likely
to have a sad, and possibly
a
short, stay in
this
vale
of
tears.
There seems to be little disagreement over the aims of the legislation.
The White Paper on Land identified them as:
(a) to enable the community to control the development of land
in accordance with its needs and priorities; and
(b)
to restore to the community the increase in the value of land
arising from its efforts.
The White Paper traced the various unsuccessful attempts made
in
the period from 1909 to 1970 to deal with the planning/betterment
problem and drew from the experience gained under the Town and
Country Planning Act 1947 and the Land Commission Act 1967 the
following lessons
:
(a) the key to positive planning, and to a successful attack on
betterment problems. is acquisition
of
land by the community;
(b) a central agency is too far removed from people and from those
responsible for planning decisions; and
(c) an inflexible scheme can only be self-defeatings
Proposals
The White Paper proposed that local authorities should be given
a power, and later placed under a duty, to acquire all land needed
for private development. From the time the duty was brought in no
development would be allowed save
on
land owned or made available
by a public
author it^.^
Land acquired by the authority would be
bought by them net of
“
development land tax
”
and at a later stage
at current use value.6 The cost of buying the land would
be
borne
by central government and any surplus arising
on
disposals would be
shared between central government, the authority collecting the surplus
and other local auth0rities.O
To put it mildly. the White Paper was not well received. The
Chairman of the Executive of the Town and Country Planning
Association thought the question to be considered was not how or
1
The Times,
April
30, 1975,
Hugh
Rossi
M.P.,
Opposition
spokesman
on
housing
2
Cmnd.
5730/1974, para.
16.
3
Para.
15.
4
Para. 27.
6
Paras.
31,
32.
6
Para. 59.
31
1
and
land.
312
THE
MODERN
LAW
REVIEW
Pol.
39
whether development land should be publicly owned but how such
land should be actuated for de~elopment.~ The Incorporated Society
of
Valuers and Auctioneers considered that existing legislation on
compulsory purchase powers and capital gains tax could bring about
the desirable social objectives mentioned in the White Paper. It
considered that the scheme was inadequately funded, that sufficient
qualified
SM
were not available to local authorities and that there
was insufficient financial incentive offered to developers
to
undertake
work on land acquired from local authorities.8 The Royal Institution
of
Chartered Surveyors felt that the Bill could cause
a
prolonged hiatus
in
the building industry and that local authorities should only acquire
land for development within the existing planning framew~rk.~ In
contrast, the Royal Town Planning Institute welcomed the White
Paper but pointed out the need for
"a
clear allocation
of
functions
between counties and districts." and the danger that acquisition
procedures would obscure social and environmental issues. It wel-
comed the change of philosophy, from the minimum use of compulsory
purchase to an attitude that development land should normally be
publicly owned.lo
The Community Land Bill was published in March
1975
and the
Act was passed on November
12, 1975.
How did the Act deal with
the key issues
of
acquisition
of
land by the community, administration
by
a
non-central agency and the need for flexibility in the scheme?
Acquisition
of
land
by
the community
Under the Bill'l every local authority was
to
have
a
wide power
to acquire, by agreement or compulsorily with the authority of the
Secretary of State,
"
any development land," after the
"
first appointed
day.**
l2
"
Development land
*'
was land which
"
in the authority's
opinion
"
was land suitable for
"
relevant development.'*
l3
Relevant
development was all development except development of such class
as
might be prescribed by regulations,14
or
the building of
a
single
dwelling-h~use.~~ This sweeping power to acquire land, limited only
by unpublished regulations and containing
less
detail about exceptions
than the White Paper had done.le aroused considerable alarm. The
lack
of
certainty was criticised by many, including Justice" and
the Law Society
l8
and the Parliamentary Opposition fought to have
7
The Times,
October 9, 1974. He called the White Paper
"
intellectually sloppy
8
(19775) 233
E.G.
113.
0
Memorandum,
The Times,
May 14, 1975.
10
(1975) 233
E.G.
114. The proposnls concerning
the
compulsory acquisition at
construction date value
of
deliberately unoccupied
office
premises
scem
to have
aroused
no
passions, para. 61-3, (Act
ss.
28-36).
11
CI. 18 (1) and
(5).
12
April 6, 1976,
D.O.D.
Circular 1, (121/75), pam.
1.
18
Clause
6
(1).
The
Act
is
more
loosely
drafted than the Bill in this area, see
15
CI.
4
(1).
18
Pams. 34, 35.
17
Memorandurn
on
the Community Land Bill, May 14, 1975.
18
Law
Society's
Gazefte,
1975, p. 834.
and inadequate."
ss.
15
(1)
and 3
(1)
and (2).
14
CI. 3
(I).
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