Tithe Act 1951
| Jurisdiction | UK Non-devolved |
| Citation | 1951 c. 62 |
Tithe Act , 1951
(14 & 15 Geo. 6) CHAPTER 62
An Act to provide, in lieu of the obligation imposed by the Tithe Act, 1936, to register all annuities charged thereby, for registration in selected districts, to amend and to repeal certain provisions of that Act, and to make further provision with respect to certain matters connected therewith.
[1st August 1951]
Be it enacted by the King's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:—
Provisions as to annuities registers
1 Repeal of provision for registers of annuities for all districts, and substituted provision as to selected districts.
(1) Section nine of the Tithe Act, 1936, in this Act referred to as ‘the principal Act’ (which requires the Tithe Redemption Commission to determine the amount of every annuity charged by that Act and the land in respect of which each is charged, and to prepare for every district a register specifying the amount of every annuity and indicating the land in respect of which each is charged) is hereby repealed, and the fact that effect has not been given to the provisions of the said section nine shall not be treated as having affected the validity of any determination made by the Commission, or of any other thing done by them, before the commencement of this Act.
(2) The Commission may prepare and seal a register of annuities charged in respect of lands in any district in the case of which it appears to them to be expedient so to do by reason of any circumstances calculated to render it difficult for persons concerned to ascertain the subsistence, amount or incidence of annuities charged in respect of lands in that district, and the provisions of subsections (4) to (9) of this section shall have effect as to any such register.
(3) So much of subsection (2) of section four of the principal Act as provides that it shall be the duty of the Commission to determine what annuities are charged, and to record particulars thereof, shall have effect, and shall be deemed always to have had effect, as requiring them so to do only where it appears to them to be requisite for the purposes of that Act or this Act.
(4) An annuities register for any district shall comprise the following particulars of every annuity charged in respect of land in the district at the date of the sealing of the register, that is to say, a specification of the amount thereof and, by reference to a map sealed on that date, an indication of the land in respect of which it is charged.
(5) Before sealing an annuities register for any district the Commission shall determine the matters particulars whereof are to be comprised therein, in accordance with the provisions of subsection (2) of section thirty-nine of the principal Act (which confers rights on persons interested to make representations and to refer questions of law to the court).
(6) The specification in a sealed annuities register of an amount as that of an annuity charged at the date of the sealing of the register, together with the indication in the map referred to therein of land as that in respect of which that annuity was then charged, shall be treated as conclusive evidence that an annuity of that amount was then charged, and that it was charged in respect of that land, unless it is shown that subsection (5) of this section was not observed as to the matter in question, and shall be treated as conclusive evidence that it was not charged in respect of any other land.
(7) A sealed annuities register for any district shall be treated as conclusive evidence that no annuity other than those particulars whereof are comprised in the register was charged in respect of any land in the district at the date of the sealing of the register.
(8) A sealed annuities register or the map referred to therein may be varied by the Commission for correcting any clerical mistake therein, or any error therein arising from any accidental slip or omission, but not otherwise.
(9) An annuities register and the map referred to therein shall when sealed be deposited at the principal office of the Commission.
(10) The power to prepare and seal an annuities register for any district shall be exercisable whenever it appears to the Commission that such circumstances as are mentioned in subsection (2) of this section have arisen therein, whether or not such a register has been sealed therefor on any earlier occasion.
(11) Where the Commission are satisfied in the case of any district that there is no annuity charged in respect of any land in the district, they may make and seal a declaration of that fact, and a declaration as to any district sealed under this subsection shall be conclusive evidence of that fact.
Any such declaration shall when sealed be deposited at the principal office of the Commission.
Amendments and repeals of certain provisions of the principal Act, and subsidiary provisions
2 Extinguished rentcharges undisclosed: exclusion from provisions for compensation and for charge of annuity.
(1) The provisions of the principal Act relating to compensation in respect of the extinguishment of tithe rentcharge shall not have effect in relation to a rentcharge in respect of which the particulars required by section five of the principal Act have not been transmitted in accordance with the requirements of that section before the commencement of this Act, without prejudice however to the validity of any issue of stock for compensation in respect thereof, or other thing done under the said provisions in relation thereto, before the commencement of this Act.
(2) The preceding subsection shall have effect in substitution for the provisions of subsection (4) of the said section five (which conferred a power on the Commission to withhold compensation, or to reduce the amount thereof or to postpone interest thereon, in the case of a rentcharge as to which the said requirements were not satisfied).
(3) Where subsection (1) of this section has effect as to a rentcharge and there has been no issue of stock for compensation in respect thereof before the commencement of this Act, section three of the principal Act (which charges annuities in respect of the lands respectively out of which rentcharges extinguished by that Act issued) shall not have effect, and shall be deemed never to have had effect, in relation to that rentcharge.
3 Additional powers for apportionment of annuities, and power to consolidate annuities.
(1) In addition to their duty under section ten of the principal Act to apportion annuities charged in respect of land in the ownership of two or more owners, to their duty under subsection (2) of section eleven thereof to apportion annuities and to their power in that behalf under subsection (5) of section fourteen thereof, the Commission shall have power—
(a ) for the purpose of securing that there shall not be more than one annuity charged in respect of any given land, to apportion annuities, and, where two or more annuities are charged in respect of the same land, to consolidate them;
(b ) to apportion an annuity which is charged in respect of land parts of which are detached from one another, as between the several parts.
(2) An apportionment under this section shall be made in the like manner, and having regard to the like matters, as in the case of an apportionment under the said section ten, and subsection (2) of that section (which relates to the extinguishment of an apportioned annuity and the charge of substituted annuities) shall have effect in relation to an apportionment under this section.
(3) Where the Commission consolidate two or more annuities charged in respect of any land, they shall make an order specifying the aggregate amount of those annuities, and those annuities shall be deemed to have been extinguished as from the day following the last payment date before the date on which the order is made, and an annuity of the aggregate amount shall be charged by virtue of the principal Act in respect of the land for the use of His Majesty for the period commencing on the day following that payment date and ending (subject to the provisions of section twenty-eight of the principal Act as to the earlier extinguishment of all annuities) on the day preceding the sixtieth anniversary of the appointed day.
(4) Any of the duties or powers of apportionment, consolidation or extinguishment conferred by the principal Act or this Act may be exercised in combination (whether by apportioning an annuity and consolidating an annuity substituted for a part thereof with another annuity or otherwise howsoever), and the orders to be made for that purpose may be made in the form of separate orders or of provisions of a single order as circumstances may appear to the Commission to require.
(5) An annuity charged on an apportionment under this section, or on a consolidation thereunder, shall be treated as falling within references in the principal Act to a ‘substituted annuity’, and accordingly, in the definition of that expression in subsection (1) of section forty-seven of the principal Act, there shall be inserted, after the reference to section ten of that Act, the words ‘and section three of the Tithe Act, 1951.’
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