Published on 4 September 2025, the Law Commission has reported back on the new projects for areas of law that need reviewing. In this article we will be looking at The Law Commission’s Fourteenth Programme of Law Reform and specifically at the proposed areas relating to property and the issues with the current law in these areas.
Agricultural tenancies
Current issues:
- Post-1995 farm business tenancies under the Agricultural Tenancies Act 1995 do not give tenants security of tenure, rent control or succession rights.
- The law does not balance the interests of landowners and tenants.
- Lack of security of tenure and short-term nature of tenancies is a barrier to investment and viability of tenanted farm businesses.
- Current law restricts tenant farmers from diversifying and adapting their businesses and benefitting from new opportunities. This may hinder economic growth and opportunity for tenant farmers.
The project will consider whether the current law:
- balances giving tenant farms sufficient security to encourage investment and maintain viable businesses;
- provides opportunities for new entrants to access farming opportunities.
- supports the interests and confidence of landlords to let land;
- impedes tenant farmers from diversifying their businesses, including sustainable farming; and
- supports a collaborative approach between landlords and tenants.
Commercial leasehold
The Law Commission’s current project, Business Tenancies: the Right to Renew, is addressing one aspect of commercial leasehold law. This project will address other issues needing review and comprises of two sub-projects.
The first sub-project will focus on commercial leasehold transactions on the basis that the law creates:
- barriers for businesses;
- prevents commercially sound transactions; and
- imposes needless bureaucracy.
Reform will be considered in two aspects of law which the commission has heard causes significant problems in practice:
- Issues with the Landlord and Tenant (Covenants) Act 1995; and
- Rights of first refusal under the Landlord and Tenant Act 1987 (in so far as the law relates to commercial premises).
The second sub-project will be a scoping project, focusing on the law governing maintenance, repair and upgrading of leased commercial buildings. There is concern that the law in this area is causing:
- confusion and unfairness; and
- has not kept pace with modern priorities (such as the need to improve the environmental sustainability of buildings or to reinvigorate the high street).
The Commission will consider the law relating to dilapidations, service charges, and the interaction between environmental frameworks and commercial leasehold law. Scoping work will create a better understanding of the current problems and to test which problems might have a law reform solution.
Deeds
Current issues:
- the law is outdated;
- not clear whether current law supports deeds wholly or partly defined by code;
- Mercury Tax Group Ltd v Her Majesty’s Commissioners of Revenue and Customs (2008) – Mr Justice Underhill referred to a document as needing to be “a discrete physical entity (whether in a single version or in a series of counterparts) at the moment of signing”; and
- some stakeholders argue that certain deed requirements, such as witnessing, attestation, and delivery, should be amended, replaced or removed.
The project will consider:
- broad issues about the efficacy of deeds, including whether the concept remains fit for purpose;
- whether there should be amendments to the existing requirements of deeds, including witnessing, attestation, and delivery; and
- whether amendments to the law of deeds are required to ensure that compliance with the requirements of deeds can be facilitated by smart contracts.
Management of housing estates
This specifically relates to housing estates where the developer, or an associated management company retains the roads and common areas of the estate. The houses are sold with the condition that the homeowners will pay a service charge for their upkeep, and sometimes for the provision of other services.
The commission has been told that these management arrangements are sometimes designed to maximise profits for the management company, with homeowners being charged excessively. Under current law, the residents on housing estates have some powers to challenge excessive fees but have no right to take over the management of their estates.
The project will consider:
- how residents could be given greater control over the management of their housing estates;
- whether the right to manage (“RTM”) regime that benefits leaseholders in blocks of flats could be adapted to apply to housing estates;
- any additional or alternative solutions to the problems of estate-management; and
- reviewing how any new scheme for the management of housing estates would interact with the current law governing the RTM in leasehold flats, and with the recommendations made by the Law Commission in their 2020 RTM Report.
Ownerless land/Bona vacantia
Ownerless land passes to the Crown. Depending on its location, it may pass to the Duchies of Cornwall or Lancaster. Other land transfers to the Treasury Solicitor as bona vacantia. The Treasury Solicitor has a power of disclaimer. If a freehold is disclaimed, the land reverts (“escheats”) to the Crown Estate.
Current issues:
- the Crown is not liable for the land unless it performs acts of management or control; there are uncertainties about what that means and it prevents the Crown from engaging with ownerless land;
- some land can have significant development potential, or can present significant environmental or safety hazards;
- stakeholders have informed the Commission about blocks of flats, dangerous industrial sites and mines, recycling centres, reservoirs, and city landmarks that have become ownerless.
- The current law is antiquated and confusing. It can provide an obstacle to returning land to profitable use, to remediating environmental and safely problems, and to development. It can mean that the Crown does not take certain measures in respect of sites.
The project will consider:
- a review of the law of bona vacantia and escheat;
- a review the Crown’s liability shield for ownerless land;
- whether some types of ownerless land should pass to a body other than the Crown;
- review powers of certain parties to obtain vesting orders; and
- the rights of leaseholders where the landlord’s title escheats.
Alongside these areas of reform, the project will aim to clarify the law, addressing the survival of derivative interests that affect ownerless land and the impact of bona vacantia and escheat on the land registration system.
Ongoing projects
Business tenancies: The right to renew
In 2023, the Law Commission accepted a reference from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government to conduct a wide review of Part 2 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1954, which gives business tenants the right (security of tenure) to renew their tenancies when they would otherwise come to an end.
The first consultation paper, published in November 2024, asked key questions about which model of security of tenure is appropriate and the scope of the Act. A second, technical, consultation paper will be published in due course.
Chancel repair liability and registration
This project formed part of the Thirteenth Programme of Law Reform. Chancel repair liability is rarely enforced, but when it is the liability can be huge.
Under the Land Registration Act 2002, a purchaser of registered land should not be bound by chancel repair liability unless it is recorded in the register. However, there are some uncertainties about the nature of the liability which raises questions about whether the 2002 Act is having the effect that was intended. It is possible that unregistered chancel repair liabilities may still be binding on purchasers.
This project is examining whether the law should be clarified so that a purchaser of land can be certain that the land is not burdened by an unregistered chancel repair liability. Due to current uncertainties about the law, homebuyers and other purchasers of land spend millions each year on searches and insurance to help protect themselves from chancel repair liability. The project has the potential to save purchasers these costs.
Chancel repair liability reforms – What’s next
Compulsory purchase
Compulsory purchase can only be carried out with statutory authority, for a public purpose and with payment of compensation to the owner.
Compulsory acquisition of property can have a huge detrimental impact on the individuals and businesses affected. The procedures of compulsory purchase, and the compensation payable to those affected, is tightly controlled by law. But the law is fragmented, unnecessarily complicated and in need of modernisation. It is substantially derived from 19th century legislation and is archaic.
The Law Commission previously conducted a project on compulsory purchase. That project culminated in reports in 2003 and 2004 on compensation and procedure. However, the recommendations were not taken forward by the Government at the time. Calls for a comprehensive, simplified and modern set of laws have persisted.
The current project is a Ministerial Reference and the sponsoring department is the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. It examines the laws governing both procedure for compulsory purchase and the assessment of compensation. Its core aim is to consolidate and codify the law, whilst making technical changes with a view to simplifying, modernising and harmonising the legislation. The Commission published a consultation paper in December 2024 and the consultation was concluded in early 2025. After analysing stakeholder responses, the Commission aims to publish a report and draft Bill.
