M9357 English Property and Land Law

Historical Context of English and Welsh Land Law and

the 1925 Property Law Reforms

Summary Notes
**These notes are a supplement to the PowerPoint with embedded
audio slideshow and should not be seen as a substitute to further study
with an English land law text book (for example: M Dixon, Modern Land
Law, ch 1)**

Statutes referred to:-

Quia Emptores Statute 1290
Statute of Uses 1535
Tenures Abolition Act 1660
Law of Property Act 1925 Section 1(1), s1(2), s 1 (3), s1(4), s7, s205(1) (xxvii), s198,
s199
The Land Registration Act 2002 s132
Land Registration Act 1925
Administration of Estates Act 1925
Land Charges Act 1925
Settled Land Act 1925
Trustee Act 1925
Land Charges Act 1972, s2

Cases referred to
Walsingham’s Case (1573) 2 Plowd 547

Historical Background
1066 – feudal system established in England and Wales by Norman Invasion – King
(William the Conqueror and descendants) owned land and permitted subjects to hold
(tenure) land for specified durations (estates) in exchange for military or non-military
services.
- Relationships – King – Tenant-n-Chief (Lord), Mesne Lords, Villeins/Serfs
- Military – barony, knight-service, castle-guard, scutage
- Non-military – serjeantry or other monetary payments.
The lord and King retained some rights of payment or reversion of the land – called
escheat;

1290 Quia Emptores Statute

- to prevent tenants from alienating lands by subinfeudation. (practice of each
tenant granting further sub-tenancies of land, creating people in between the
Crown and the final tenure holder.)

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M9357 English Property and Land Law

- tenants were only allowed to alienate by substitution, so that the person they
alienated to, took their place and was responsible to the same original lord.
- beginning of the replacement of feudal obligations with cash rents and
monetary transactions.

Development of Law of Equity

- 3 law courts: Court of King’s Bench, Court of Common Pleas and the Exchequer,
the claim had to fit a form of action.
- Where the law didn’t allow for a claim, appeal to the King was allowed, who
appointed the Chancellor, sitting in Court of Chancery, to hear these claims.
- Chancellor had discretion to grant a remedy where the law did not allow one,
an equitable remedy.
- Cases from this court created precedent = law of equity. L
- led to the development of ‘uses’.

1535 - Statute of Uses

- Tried to limit ‘uses’
- Purpose to increase revenue to king

1660 Tenures Abolition Act

- aimed to abolish feudalism.
- No services could now be rendered in exchange for tenure.
- To recompense the monarch for the money lost, a tax on alcohol was
introduced.

Law of Property Act 1925 and other 1925 Acts

1925 Property Legislation

Aim: simplification of English Land Law

Post-war context
Two competing ideas, one was that land should be freely transferable, the second that
owners should have rights to fragment and divide up ownership and create new
interests.

Relevant statutes and brief description overleaf

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M9357 English Property and Land Law

Law of Property Act 1925 - limit legal recognition of estates and interests to those
specified in section 1 and relegate all other interests to equity.

Land Registration Act 1925 – compulsory land registration system.

A. Registration of land would create a comprehensive register of the estates,
land and interests in the land
B. Registration of charges would allow for specific types of interest in land to be
registered even if the land itself was not, reducing the burden of the doctrine
of notice. This was to be a temporary solution until all land was registered.

Land Registration Act 2002 is now main statute for registration, superseding
this 1925 Act.

Administration of Estates Act 1925 – changed law of primogeniture

Settled Land Act 1925 – limits of settlement (passing property to future generations)

Trustee Act 1925 – codified trustee duties

Land Charges Act 1925 – encumbrances on unregistered land. See also now the Land
Charges Act 1972

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