England and Wales Land Control Disclosure Rules 2027

The statutory instrument published on legislation.gov.uk may look like something only property specialists would read. But its effect is wider than that. The Provision of Information (Contractual Control) (Registered Land) Regulations 2026, made on 8 June 2026 and coming into force on 6 April 2027, create a reporting system for certain rights over registered land in England and Wales. The broad aim is transparency. A right over land can sit in the background for years, especially where a future housing or commercial scheme is being lined up. These regulations, made under the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023 and approved by both Houses of Parliament, are meant to make more of that hidden control visible.

The rules do not cover every promise people make about land. They focus on written rights over a registered estate, usually excluding short leasehold interests with fewer than 15 years left to run. The main examples are an option to require a sale or long lease, a conditional obligation to enter into a sale or long lease if stated conditions are met, a right of pre-emption, and a right to require the owner to transfer or grant a long lease to another person chosen under the contract. **What this means:** if a contract gives someone real influence over whether land is sold, when it is sold, or to whom it is sold, the agreement may fall inside the scheme. A relevant disposition here means either a transfer of the legal estate or the grant of a lease for 15 years or more, so the regulations are aimed at serious control over land rather than minor or short-lived arrangements.

The duty usually falls on the grantee, which is the person entitled to enforce the right. From 6 April 2027, that person will normally have 60 days to give the Chief Land Registrar the required information after the right is granted, assigned or varied in writing. There is also a backfill rule. If the right was granted after 8 June 2026 but before the start date, the information must still be provided by 6 October 2027. The timing matters because the system is tied to Land Registry applications too. If someone applies for a notice or restriction, which are entries used to record or control dealings with title, the contractual control information must be supplied at the same time. That even reaches some rights granted by a person who was not yet the registered proprietor when the deal was made, if the right is later put forward for protection on the register.

So what has to be disclosed? The list is detailed. It includes the names of the grantor and grantee, identifying details for companies or partnerships, the grantor's date and place of birth if the grantor is an individual, the type of right, the date and description of the contract, when the right can first be exercised or what conditions must be met, the title number, and the address of the land. The regulations also ask for something quite revealing: the initial period of control and the fuller period of control once extensions and extension rights are taken into account. In plain English, the register should not just show that a right exists. It should also show how long the land may be tied up, whether one party can stretch that period, whether either side can end it early, and whether only part of a site, or even separate airspace, is affected.

The reporting duty does not end once the right is logged. If the right is later determined, expires, or is exercised, the grantee must normally tell the registrar within 60 days. The same is true if only part of the right ends or is used: the update must explain whether the change is complete or partial and, if only part of the land is involved, identify that part clearly. There is also a practical rule about how the information is sent. In most cases it must go to the registrar digitally through the channels used for title register applications, and it must be sent by a conveyancer. The registrar can relax that requirement where insisting on it would be unreasonable, and can also waive the requirement to provide the grantor's date and place of birth if the grantee cannot reasonably be expected to supply those details.

Publication is where these regulations become more than a filing exercise. The registrar must keep the information and, as soon as possible after 6 April 2028, publish a dataset of it, updating that information at least once a month. If data appears wrong or misleading, the registrar may correct it or leave it out. If a right has ended, expired or been exercised, the registrar may say so alongside the published record. There is an important privacy line. The registrar must not publish the grantor's date of birth or place of birth, even though those details may have to be provided. The registrar may also set conditions for access to the published data, including asking a person who wants access to identify themselves. **What this means:** the scheme is meant to open up the market, but not by publishing every personal detail.

Not every agreement is caught. The schedule carves out rights connected with national security or defence, certain rights used as security for a loan or financial instrument, and some rights linked to payments owed to a former owner of the land. Rights with a total period of control of less than 18 months, once any built-in extensions are counted, are excluded too. That matters because the policy is aimed more at longer-running control of land than at short bridging arrangements. Another major limit is purpose. A right is exempt if it is held only for purposes that do not relate to future development creating one or more homes, or a building with at least 100 square metres of new floorspace. Rights in section 106 planning agreements are also excluded where they relate only to infrastructure, amenities or services connected with planning permission. That tells us something important about the policy choice here: ministers are looking most closely at land control linked to sizeable development.

Why does this matter beyond property lawyers and developers? Because land can be shaped long before a planning application appears in public. Options, conditional contracts and pre-emption rights can quietly decide which sites are realistically available, who gets first access to them, and how long communities wait before anything visible happens. A public dataset will not answer every question, but it should make it easier for researchers, councils, journalists and local residents to see where control sits. There is also real pressure behind the paperwork. Regulation 10 allows the registrar to refuse to register or update a notice or restriction that seems to relate to one of these rights if the disclosure duty has not been met. So this is not a symbolic extra form. It is a new compliance gate inside the land registration system. The explanatory note on legislation.gov.uk says no full impact assessment was prepared because no significant effect was expected, but for anyone dealing in strategic land, the change is more than administrative: it turns private control into information that may later be checked, challenged and compared.