Chancel Repair Liability

HM Land Registry's own guidance defines the liability directly: 'Chancel repair liability is the liability of the owner of land to pay for the repair of the chancel of a parish church (see Aston Cantlow and Wilmcote with Billesley Parochial Church Council v Wallbank [2003] UKHL 37).' The right to enforce it, and to collect the money, rests with the parochial church council in England and with the Representative Body of the Church in Wales in Wales. It attaches to land that was formerly 'rectorial', which is not necessarily land situated close to the church building itself, and can bind private individuals, ecclesiastical corporations, universities, colleges and other corporate bodies who are known as lay rectors.

In the Aston Cantlow litigation, Mr and Mrs Wallbank inherited a former rectory and, in Lord Nicholls' words, faced a claim concerning 'the liability of a lay rector, or lay impropriator, for the repair of the chancel of a church.' They argued the Human Rights Act 1998 made it unlawful for the parochial church council to enforce this liability against them. The House of Lords rejected that argument, holding that 'A parochial church council is not a core public authority, nor does it become such by virtue of section 6(3)(b) when enforcing a lay rector's liability for chancel repairs. Accordingly the Human Rights Act affords lay rectors no relief from their liabilities.' The result was that the liability, though widely regarded by the Law Commission as an unsatisfactory relic, remained fully enforceable.

Historically, chancel repair liability could bind a buyer of registered land automatically as an 'overriding interest' even though it did not appear on the register. That automatic protection ended at midnight on 12 October 2013, and HM Land Registry's Practice Guide 66 explains that since then the liability must be protected by an entry on the register (or, for unregistered land, a caution against first registration) to bind a later buyer for value. HM Land Registry notes that 'There have been arguments that chancel repair liability is not an interest in land that can be protected by notice. HM Land Registry currently operates on the basis that it does constitute such an interest,' and it will serve notice on the registered proprietor before making such an entry.