Town or village green - application for registration of land as class C green - 20-year user requirement satisfied even though period relied on not occurring immediately prior to date of application

Oxfordshire County Council v Oxford City Council and another: ChD (Mr Justice Lightman): 22 January 2004

The second defendant applied to the claimant registration authority for the registration of certain land as a class C green pursuant to section 22 of the Commons Registration Act 1965, on the basis that local residents had indulged in games on the land for 20 years as of right causing the land to become a green on 1 August 1990, a date well before the date of the application.

The first defendant, as owner of the land, objected to the application.

The claimant caused a non-statutory public inquiry to be held, the conclusions of which raised a number of legal questions on which the claimant sought guidance from the High Court, including whether an application that specified as the date on which the land became a green a date earlier than the date immediately preceding the date of the application had to fail.

George Laurence QC and Ross Crail (instructed by the Solicitor, Oxfordshire County Council, Oxford) for the claimant; Charles George QC and Philip Petchey (instructed by the Solicitor, Oxford City Council, Oxford) for the first defendant; Douglas Edwards and Jeremy Pike (instructed by Public Law Solicitors, Birmingham) for the second defendant.

Held, that on a true construction of section 22 any 20-year period commencing after 1950 would do; that, accordingly, subject to being able to prove 20 years of qualifying user prior to 1 August 1990, the second defendant would be entitled to have the land registered on that basis irrespective of whether it had continued to be so used since that date.

(WLR)