Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 1:

In page 7, between lines 33 and 34, to insert the following: “Report on the establishment of a Land Price Register

8. The Minister shall, not later than 6 months after the passing of this Act, commission and publish a report on the establishment of a Land Price Register to be operated by Tailte Éireann which would—

(a) expand the register that records residential property sales prices,

(b) establish a new land and other non-residential property transaction database,

(c) set out in detail all other key considerations.”.

To save time, I will speak to all three of my amendments. We can deal with them as a group informally. I do not intend to press any of them but i want the opportunity to raise their content with the Minister of State directly in order that he and his officials can at least consider the arguments at a later date. Two of them relate directly to recommendations that the committee made during pre-legislative scrutiny, and one relates to an issue that has been brought to my attention.

The first amendment in my name, amendment No. 2, relates to the digitisation process for the Land Registry. I am sure that in the Minister of State's constituency work, as with mine and that of others, he has dealt with cases involving disputes over title. Unfortunately, because of historical anomalies in the pre-digitised Land Registry records or inadequacies in the digitisation process itself, these disputes can be very significant. These can be very difficult to resolve when the Land Registry records are not accurate. I raised this on Second Stage. Once the Bill is passed and Tailte Éireann is created, one of the first things it will be really useful for the Land Registry facility to consider will be a review of the digitisation process. This should involve assessing the extent and causes of the problems to ascertain whether they can be resolved. I am interested in hearing the Minister of State's thoughts on it. Could the Department request Tailte Éireann to do this work in its first year or 18 months of existence?