Law of Property (Amendment) Act 1926

4Date of effective registration and priority notices

(1)Any person intending to make an application for the registration of any contemplated charge, instrument, or other matter in pursuance of the [15 Geo. 5. c. 22.] Land Charges Act, 1925, or any rule made thereunder, may give a priority notice in the prescribed form at least two days before the registration is to take effect, and where such a notice is given—

(a)the notice shall be entered in the register to which the intended application when made will relate;

(b)if the application is presented within fourteen days thereafter and refers in the prescribed manner to the notice, the registration shall take effect as if the registration had been made at the time when the charge, instrument, or matter was created, entered into, made, or arose, and the date at which the registration so takes effect shall be deemed to be the date of registration; and where any two charges, instruments, or matters are contemporaneous, and one (whether or not protected by a priority notice) is subject to or dependent on the other which is protected by a priority notice, the subsequent or dependent charge, instrument, or matter shall be deemed to have been created, entered into, or made, or to have arisen after the registration of the other.

(2)Where a purchaser has obtained an official certificate of the result of search, any entry which is made in the register after the date of the certificate and before the completion of the purchase, and is not made pursuant to a priority notice entered on the register before the certificate is issued, shall not, if the purchase is completed before the expiration of the second day after the date of the certificate, affect the purchaser.

(3)In reckoning the number of days under this section, Sundays and other days when the registry is not open to the public shall be excluded.

(4)Rules may be made under the said Act—

(a)for determining the date on which applications and notices shall be treated for the purposes of this section as having been made or given;

(b)for determining the times and order at and in which applications and priority notices are to be registered;

(c)for varying the number of days fixed by this section;

(d)for adapting the provisions of this section to local land charges.

(5)Where rules are made varying the number of days fixed by this section, this section shall have effect as if the number so varied were substituted for the number specified in this section.