Background to the consultation paper

1.1 On 18 May 2000 the Lord Chancellor appointed Sir Andrew Leggatt to undertake a review of tribunals. The report of the review was published on 16 August 2001.[1] The key recommendation of the report was that there should be a single tribunals service under the administrative control of the Lord Chancellor’s Department. A consultation paper about the Leggatt Review report was also issued by the Lord Chancellor’s Department in August 2001.

1.2 The Leggatt Review noted that, in the context of land, property and housing tribunals “[t]here are confusing overlaps of jurisdiction between courts and tribunals, as well as between tribunals” and that “an expert decision-making forum, without overlapping jurisdictions, is a precondition of effective procedural reform”.[2] The Review therefore recommended that the Law Commission should be instructed to work out “a comprehensive solution”, with a view to removing these overlaps and the current scope for forum shopping. The matter was formally referred to us on 8 November 2002.

The terms of reference

1.3 Our terms of reference are as follows.

“In the context provided for the future of tribunals by the report of the Leggatt Review of Tribunals [3] and the Modernising Tribunals programme, to review the law relating to the tribunals listed below, including their procedures and composition, and in particular the relationship between the jurisdictions of those tribunals and of the courts or other tribunals, with the aim of making recommendations to ensure that the objectives of the Leggatt Review, as identified in its terms of reference[4], are met in relation to the work of those tribunals.

The tribunals are as follows:

(1) the Agricultural Lands Tribunal,[5]

(2) the Commons Commissioners,

(3) the Lands Tribunal,

(4) the Leasehold Valuation Tribunal,5

(5) the Rent Assessment Committees,5

(6) the Rent Tribunal,⁵

(7) the Valuation Tribunal,⁵ and

(8) such other related tribunals as the Law Commission and the Lord Chancellor’s Department may agree.”

1.4 The Law Commission and the Lord Chancellor’s Department have agreed that the adjudicator to HM Land Registry, which was established under the Land Registration Act 2002, will also be included within the terms of this review.

1.5 It will be noted that the terms of reference refer only to tribunals in England. Consideration of tribunals in Wales is therefore outside of our terms of reference. The administration of five of the seven land, valuation and housing tribunals has been transferred to the National Assembly for Wales.[6]

1.6 Our terms of reference have not lead us to consider the procedures of the land, valuation and housing tribunals in detail. Primary legislation should contain a relatively broad rule-making power which would enable tribunals’ procedures to be changed if and where necessary.

scope of the consultation paper

1.7 The Lord Chancellor’s Department has asked us to complete our project within the timescale provided for implementing the wider changes to the tribunals system resulting from the Leggatt Review. Given those time constraints, we have produced this short consultation paper which is somewhat different from a standard Law Commission consultation paper. We put forward broad options for reform and raise some open-ended questions. Our aim is that these should be used as a basis for discussion between the Law Commission and interested parties. Consultation questions are listed at the end of Parts IV and V of the paper.

1.8 The consultation questions are also summarised in tabular form in a separate document with this consultation paper. Consultees may wish to use this document to set out their responses, which can then be either posted to us or emailed to [email protected].

content of the consultation paper

1.9 Part II contains a brief summary of the seven land, valuation and housing tribunals and of the adjudicator to HM Land Registry.

1.10 In Part III we seek to identify the need for reform.

1.11 In Part IV we present our three suggested options for structural reform.

1.12 In Part V we consider the question of jurisdictional overlaps.

1.13 In Part VI we discuss the way forward.

1.14 This consultation paper also contains eight appendices, one for each of the land, valuation and housing tribunals covered by our terms of reference. These appendices contain our review of each tribunal and, in particular, a comprehensive list of the jurisdictions of each as we have identified them. The appendices set out the tribunals’ jurisdictions as a matter of law. They do not reflect the realities of tribunals’ practice. For example, although we have compiled a detailed summary of Rent Tribunal jurisdictions, we understand from the Residential Property Tribunal Service that the Rent Tribunals only deal with about five cases a year.

advisory group

1.15 We will be holding meetings with representatives of the land, valuation and housing tribunals and with representatives of their user groups and other interested parties. The first meeting of this advisory group was held on 2 December and further meetings are planned. We are grateful to members of the advisory group for their time commitment. Their views and the responses of consultees to this consultation paper will be of valuable assistance in shaping our final proposals. The current members of the advisory group are listed in Appendix A to this paper. The members of the group have not been involved in the drafting of this consultation paper, and nothing in it should be taken as representing their views, or the views of the organisations they represent.

[1]Report of the Review of Tribunals by Sir Andrew Leggatt: Tribunals for Users – One System, One Service (August 2001), (“the Leggatt Review”).

[2]Leggatt Review, para 3.30.

[3]Tribunals for Users: One System, One Service (2001). (footnote in original).

[4]The terms of reference were “To review the delivery of justice through tribunals other than ordinary courts of law, constituted under an Act of Parliament by a Minister of the Crown or for the purposes of a Minister’s functions; in resolving disputes, whether between citizens and the state, or between other parties, to ensure that:

There are fair, timely, proportionate and effective arrangements for handling those disputes, within an effective framework for decision-making which encourages the systematic development of the area of law concerned, and which forms a coherent structure, together with the superior courts, for the delivery of administrative justice;

The administrative and practical arrangements for supporting those decision-making procedures meet the requirements of the European Convention on Human Rights for independence and impartiality;

There are adequate arrangements for improving people’s knowledge and understanding of their rights and responsibilities in relation to such disputes, and that tribunals and other bodies function in a way which makes those rights and responsibilities a reality;

The arrangements for the funding and management of tribunals and other bodies by Government departments are efficient, effective and economical; and pay due regard both to judicial independence, and to ministerial responsibility for the administration of public funds;

Performance standards for tribunals are coherent, consistent, and public; and effective measures for monitoring and enforcing those standards are established; and

Tribunals overall constitute a coherent structure for the delivery of administrative justice.

The review may examine, insofar as it considers it necessary, administrative and regulatory bodies which also make judicial decisions as part of their functions.” (footnote in original).

[5] The review will not cover these tribunals in so far as they operate in Wales. (footnote in original).

[6]The devolved tribunals are the Leasehold Valuation Tribunal, the Rent Assessment Committee, the Rent Tribunal, the Agricultural Land Tribunal and the Valuation Tribunal. The Lands Tribunal and the Commons Commissioners are not devolved.

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You are here: BAILII >> Databases >> The Law Commission >> LAND, VALUATION AND HOUSING TRIBUNALS (A Consultation Paper) [2002] EWLC 170(1) (12 December 2002) URL: http://www.bailii.org/ew/other/EWLC/2002/170(1).html Cite as: [2002] EWLC 170(1)