§ MR. MAURICE HEALYI beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether tenant purchasers who bought prior to the passing of the Registration of Title (Ireland) Act are obliged, when registering their title under that Act, to pay the cost of registry searches, whereas in the case of purchasers since the Act the titles are registered by the Land Commission without any expense to the purchasers; whether a great deal of the delay in answering requisitions on title has arisen owing to this cause; and whether, in order to facilitate registration, and in view of the fact that the Act imposes on prior purchasers a burden not contemplated by them when purchasing, it would be possible to deal with such purchasers so far as the cost of searches is concerned in the same manner as purchasers subsequent to the Act are dealt with?
MR. J. MORLEYIn the cases of tenants who have completed their purchases since the passing of the Act, these are forthwith registered without expense of searches, no searches being necessary. In the cases of sales completed before the passing of the Act, the cost of searches, amounting generally, I understand, to a few shillings only, and of clearing the title, if there has been a devolution, falls on the applicant, unless he has sent in his application through the Laud Commission, who are authorised to have the searches made without charge. One thousand two hundred and thirty-four applications of this sort have been filed by the Land Commission, while 7,762 purchasers have lodged applications themselves. It is probable that some of the delay in answering requisitions is caused by the unwillingness of applicants to incur the cost of searches. As regards the cases of purchasers prior to the passing of the Act, and the possibility of freeing them from the cost of searches, which is being done in many cases by the Land Commission, it seems 773 to be a question for the Treasury whether all such cases shall be treated in this way.