David Norris (Independent)

I thank Senator Quinn for making time available to me and I welcome the Minister to the House. The Minister is a very impressive performer in the House and we all appreciate his coming in person rather than sending a Minister of State. He has dealt with this matter in a very clear, forensic, detailed way that illuminates many of the issues we are confronting.

I concur with the Minister's view on the removal of so much ancient and redundant statute law and his contention that this Bill is a significant contribution to the process of regulatory reform. The Government has committed itself to this. We have considered several Bills in respect of which the Minister took exactly the same approach, one of which we dealt with in recent weeks. We had some fun looking at the out-of-date material. It is right to get rid of this dead wood and make our system more efficient. The Minister put the aforementioned process in a global economic context. Even though we have quite a high standing in terms of efficiency — I believe we are 15th on the list — we are behind many other European countries in terms of the number of procedures required and the number of days it takes to process the material in question.

The Minister indicated there will be Government amendments. This suggests that the Bill is open to amendment and therefore I will suggest one to improve efficiency and reduce the duplication that is involved in the legal process when searching for or confirming titles. This was touched on by Senator Cummins and perhaps by Senator Mansergh, but not in the detailed way I would like. I and probably every Member in the House have been through this legal process and it seems mad that one must pay to engage in it. Dusty deeds are taken out and the chain of succession is traced right back to the original owner of the property in question. All the information is examined and certified, after which the sale can proceed. However, if one wants to remortgage one's property, as I did, the same firm of solicitors may be asked to go through exactly the same rigmarole for a second time. Given that they have done so already and have been paid to do so, why should one have to pay a second time for a completely redundant exercise in nonsensical duplication?

As far as I am aware, this matter is not addressed in the Bill. Sections refer to what is termed the "manner of searches". I wonder if the Minister believes it appropriate to table an amendment or accept one by me to ensure that searches would be carried out only once? When the Minister has very appropriately centralised the system in a new statutory body, it should be sufficient for a search to be completed once. Thus, there would be centralised registration and the relevant file would be stamped. If one wanted to remortgage, the registry staff would be able to say the necessary work has already been done. What on earth is the point in carrying out exactly the same search twice? It is to make money easily for firms of solicitors. Paying twice is not fair and should be addressed in the Bill. I hope this will be done because it would save decent people, who make the largest investment of their lives when purchasing a house, from having to accept extra and unnecessary charges. I ask the Minister to consider this.

It is always interesting to hear the history of a Bill. The Minister has a habit, which I find delightful, of introducing a little antique information that gives us a sense of period.

We are getting rid of a whole series of legislation spanning the reigns of Queen Anne, King William, the Georges, Queen Victoria and so on. The Minister mentioned the statute of 1707. I once considered tabling an amendment to abolish this statute. I could not imagine anybody opposing the abolition of a statute designed to stop"papists"— note the offensive language — from using their Protestant neighbours as a shelter for keeping land, when Roman Catholic citizens were not permitted to hold land or buildings above a certain value. That was a shameful, disgraceful and disgusting statute. It is wonderful, however, to see the human context behind the legislation, from which it is evident that decent Protestant people were prepared to act as surrogates to protect the landholdings of their Catholic neighbours. While there were many instances of such neighbourliness, sadly there were also Protestants who would pose as good neighbours and then grab the land.

The novels of William Carleton record such cases. His work is largely forgotten now, butValentine McClutchy and Fardorougha the Miser are replete with this type of legal chicanery. The statute shows, on the one hand, a heartwarming neighbourliness even in 1707 that a mean-spirited government tried to counteract. On the other hand, there were awful situations in which people grabbed their neighbours' land.

A final matter which may not be capable of being addressed is the question of so-called squatter's rights whereby people acquire title by lodging themselves on land. I can cite an example of this in my own family. An elderly Hungarian connection of mine came to live in County Wicklow. Her husband, my relative, was killed in a tragic accident leaving her traumatised. She had already been traumatised when her family lost a great deal on the collapse of the dual monarchy inAustria-Hungary, an event followed by the Nazi invasion and, worst of all for her, the communist invasion. She became an eccentric recluse and was made a ward of court because she was deemed incapable of controlling her money.

Some neighbours began to encroach on her property and other good neighbours told me about this. There was a hearing in the local court to determine title. Although at this stage the lady would have nothing to do with me, I wrote to the court setting out her position and asking that the court protect her rights. Instead, the court appeared to award title to an encroaching neighbour. That is wrong.

People in that situation should have their rights. I tried, as a connection of some kind, to protect her rights even though I did not have her authority to do so — we subsequently became close again. It is not right that vulnerable people should be subject to this kind of squatter's right and encroachment. I hope something may be done to remedy this problem.

My principal point, with which there is general agreement, is to press for a system that would eliminate the nonsense of going through searches a dozen times. Let it be done once, stamped and centrally registered so one can find it on the Internet and see the searches have been made. That would be an important element of this Bill or perhaps of other legislation — the Minister might inform the House whether that is the case. Such a system would make the registration of title more efficient.