Brendan Griffin (Kerry, Fine Gael)
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739. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if he will provide the history and the Land Commission records of a plot of ground (details supplied) in County Kerry; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [8762/23]

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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Iadvise the Deputy that a parcel of land in the townland of Meanus comprising 2.16 hectares was sold by the former Irish Land Commission (ILC) to trustees, to be held subject to the trusts of a Scheme framed and approved under Sections 4 and 20 of the Irish land Acts 1903. A Purchase Agreement was signed in May 1936 and the land was vested by the former ILC in these trustees in October 1948 and subsequently registered on folio KY 24138.

Trustees have not been appointed by a Minister since 1948. The registration of the Folio was amended by the GAA through a Solicitor in 1983 and 2005. An Inhibition was placed on Folio KY 24138 in 2005 by the GAA and a 99-year lease to Castlemaine Community Services Group Limited was registered on the Folio in 2006. My Department registered an inhibition on the folio in 2009 preventing any change to the ownership of the folio without prior notice to my Department.

In April 2022, the Property Registration Authority (PRA) notified my Department that an application to amend the registration on folio KY 24138 had been lodged. My Department requested that the lodging party withdraw the application as it was not the correct process for updating the registration of an ILC trust property. The matter is currently under review in my Department.

Access to the records of the former Irish Land Commission held by the Records Branch at its premises in Portlaoise is governed by the Land Purchase Act Rules 1939 (S.I. No. 341 of 1939). Order XIX of the rules states-

Certified copies of abstracts of title or documents connected therewith, agreements for sale between vendor and purchaser, undertakings to purchase from the Land Commission, conveyances to purchasers, vesting orders and fiats, shall not be issued without leave of the Judicial Commissioner or the direction of the Examiner, except to vendors or purchasers their successors in title or their respective solicitors.

If the Deputy is making this query on behalf of a constituent, that individual, or their solicitor, should make contact with the Records Branch of my Department. The contact details for Records Branch are set out below:

Records Branch,

Legal Services Division,

Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine,

Unit 11 Clonminam Business Park,

Portlaoise,

Co. Laois

R32 Y033

Ph: 057 8634988

Email: recordsbranch@agriculture.gov.ie