Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 2 Feb 2000

Vol. 513 No. 4

Written Answers. - Registration of Title.

Michael Bell

Ceist:

81 Mr. Bell asked the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform the steps, if any, being taken to deal with the huge backlog at the Land Registry (details supplied); the number of dealings waiting to be processed at the latest date for which figures are available; his views on whether it is acceptable that the Land Registry can only accept phone calls for one hour per day at its Dublin office; the plans, if any, he has to provide additional resources for the office; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2515/00]

Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform (Mr. O'Donoghue)

As the Deputy is no doubt aware, arising out of the buoyancy in the economy and the current high level of activity in the housing market, the number of dealings being lodged with, and the level of business being transacted by the Land Registry and Registry of Deeds has been increasing steadily for some years now and has been subject to unprecedented increases in recent years. The intake of property transactions by the Land Registry has increased from 91,060 in 1993 to 133,000 in 1999. At the end of 1999 there was an arrear of 86,074 applications despite the significant deficiencies that have generated by the registries which has led to an increase of 35% in the overall output of transactions completed by the registry.

As a result of this situation, the registrar found that an increasing amount of resources were being diverted to answering telephone inquiries about the arrear rather than dealing with cases. In this light the Land Registry management reluctantly decided, as an interim measure and subject to review at the end of March 2000, to restrict telephone inquiries to allow the staff of the registries to tackle the backlog of dealings and to register as many cases as possible. I would like to emphasise that this restriction applies only to telephone inquiries and does not affect the service provided to inquiries at the public counter of the offices of the Land Registry.

I am very pleased to take this opportunity to inform the Deputy that, following the case I made to the Department of Finance for the allocation of additional staff to the Land Registry, sanction has very recently been received to increase the core numbers of the staff of the Land Registry by 77.

I am satisfied that the provision of additional staff, together with the implementation of the new title registration information system will in time, allow the Land Registry to offer a much improved level of delivery of services to customers.