I'm new to this. Just trying to decide whether to sign contracts on a property with Chancel Repair Liability. It looks like potentially the whole of England could have this problem as the records are not accessable and accurate. It does put me off of going to church! Maybe the church should look at this and do something about it. I have no problem with helping out the church but I don't think its a Christian act to force people to pay this money.

yeah the solicitor we had mentined something about it could be but didnt seem to know too much ink we will just try and wait out for 3 years hoping not to get billed

if i look it up on land registry wont that let the church know and they may grab at the chance for new pews or tithe dish or roof etc

I like skulls
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Happy fun memories! Prog3 for the win!

It is a bit confusing. It certainly seems that if the church hasn't registered an interest in your property by 2013 that you will be safe. I think you could find out by checking with the land registry, but if you are concerned, the best thing to do would be to check with your solicitor/conveyancer.

this is all confusing can anyone clarify that in 2013 if no interest is shown we are safe from the church and how would we know if the church has shown an interest

Well, I'm not sure it's the government's responsibility to maintain churches - it seems the congregation are usually asked first ;)

But it's a good point - as I understand it there is certainly government funding available for repairs to ageing churches through English Heritage - I have no idea what the situation would have been in 1932, but presumably funding would still have been available in some form.

"Go figure"? It's easy to figure. Who do you think is usually asked for money whenever a church needs repairing?

Clearly in 1932 an astute politician saw a nice opportunity to reduce the Crown's own liabilities, by shifting them on a few unfortunate subjects.
(Which also explains the 10-year gap in the last law: Her Majesty's Government does have an interest in the Church enacting that law as much as possible.)

Quite; at least the law is going to change in 2013, but why there has to be a 10 year gap after deciding to do that is anyone's guess - and it doesn't help anyone whose glebe land the church has already registered an interest in, they'll still have to pay up.

To be fair to the church, some parishes have apparently pledged not to do anything about their glebes, so I guess that's something.

One thing I didn't mention was that it did actually come up in the courts back in 1932, when someone was sent to jail for not paying for chancel repair. Instead of doing away with it, the government of the day actually brought in a law shifting responsibility from ecclesiastical courts to county courts, reinforcing the liability which had until then had apparently been assumed to be antiquated and unenforceable. Go figure.

Uh... wow. Why don't they just abolish these claims altogether? Giving churches free reign to be parasitic on someone who purchases land is a bit idiotic.

Yayayayayayayayay! That was so awesome this morning! And very elaborately packed, I was concerned there would be nothing in those boxes!
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As someone who's just jumped from android to iphone, I can happily say that the iphone 4 is the best phone I've ever owned. Possibly because of the hallucinogenic chemicals they cover the screen in, admittedly.

We should have an annual get-together of sharing BT fail stories.

http://www.growse.com/news/comments/bt-fail/

http://www.growse.com/news/comments/that-back-breaking-lugging-all-my-stuff-across-london-time-of-year-again/

*tips hat*

Have some cake on me. Bravo sir.

I was expecting a blog entry about Portal 2!

Still, I want the cake now.