Section 92: Land registry network
151.Section 92 enables the registrar to establish an electronic communications network, either himself or through a third party, which will be used as he sees fit in connection with registration, and with the carrying out of transactions which involve registration and are capable of being effected electronically. Electronic conveyancing is likely to involve a significant change in the practices of both the Land Registry and of conveyancers. The ways in which it will operate in detail will, therefore, need to be worked out with them, after extensive consultation. These ways are likely to change as the range of conveyancing transactions carried out electronically increases, and as electronic commerce in general expands. The main elements are, however, likely to be that:
conveyancers will, as now, prepare draft documents but in electronic form;
those drafts will be shown to the Land Registry, as well as to the parties to the transaction during preparation, to enable errors and discrepancies to be identified at the earliest possible stage;
once the drafts are approved and a date and time for execution set, the documents will be executed and simultaneous amendments made to the entry in the register, directly by the responsible conveyancer;
the Land Registry will also have to make sure that do-it-yourself conveyancers would not be excluded from electronic conveyancing.
152.Schedule 5 establishes a framework for the creation and use of the network.
