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Carry On Land Office! PDF Print E-mail
Thursday, 31 May 2007

Though there were several initiatives aiming at dividing the uniform land registration system, the land administration successfully proved that they have been able to maintain the efficiency and the legal security in the usual way. For me it is quite evident that the tasks of public administration can be solved with the greatest efficiency in the current uniform system. The land administration has to go on with the electronic case management for improving the efficiency and the legal security. Services should be provided on equal conditions both for the players of business life, the citizens and the organizations of the State budget.

Long live the servicing land office!

Dr. Norbert Berczi
Dezső and co. Lawyers' Office

The land and other properties have an extraordinary significance both in the business life and in civilian transactions. When making a contract, the proprietorship has to be proven. In Hungary, this is the duty of the authentic land registration system. 

Some years ago, great publicity was given to the dispute about the reorganization of the land registration system. This dispute was characterized from one side by the nostalgia to the old „Grundbuch” /land book. The opinion of the Ministry of Justice is that the recording and maintenance of the rights in land (e. g. proprietorship right) and burdens (e.g. mortgage) would be the duty of the courts.

The other standpoint: ’The land offices have been performing this duty on a higher level than the old Grundbuch system’.  The place and location of the land parcels, the contours of existing buildings or other constructions are presented in the cadastral maps and they update the changes both in the maps and in the property sheets. The cadastral maps and the registry of legal facts together form the uniform land registration system.

The uniform land registration system is fully computerised. Nowadays, the property sheet of any land or other real estate can be accessed from the layer’s office too. This was not possible in the former Grundbuch system. The Grundbuch did not contain all data, and the electronic contact did not exist either. The TakarNet system that realized all expectations has reached the recognition of the European professional circles too.

The Institute of Geodesy, Cartography and Remote Sensing (FÖMI) – that has been performing both research and development duties – is the centre of the IT system connecting the land offices with each other. All these form the professional sector responsible for land administration that also performs official duties as an authority coordinating the utilisation of agricultural lands too. Evidently, this is very important for the whole national economy, what is happening with the organization of land administration.

Holding out against the initiatives aiming at dividing the uniform land registration system, the land administration successfully proved that they have been able to maintain the efficiency and the legal security in the usual way. Cooperating with lawyers, public notaries and banks, the land offices judge more than three million applications yearly, while the number of requested legal remedies can be measured in thousandths only. In the past period, the voice of those fighting for the division of the land registry and the land management sector faded away.

In the meantime, new developments were realized. The digitization of the cadastral maps will be completed in this year (2007). In 2005, aerial photographs were produced of the whole area of Hungary. Based on those aerial photographs, so called orthophotographs were prepared. Being photographs in fact, all natural and artificial terrain objects could be identified and precise measurements could be carried out with them.  

The property sheet, the cadastral map and the orthophotograph are available in digital format, so they can be interconnected on the computer. As a result of this development, areas well know in nature or from development plans, also the legal boundaries of the properties there can be easily identified and the relevant property sheets can be procured quickly. All these support the decision-making to be more efficient both in the business life and in the public administration.

The financing of land administration is going under changes. Till the end of the previous year, less than half of the cost was paid from the central budget; the rest had to be covered from the income. A significant part of the income was originating from servicing of property sheet copies. In 2006, the central budget support decreased to a small fraction, by now it covers 4% of the costs only. But, from 1st January 2007, administration servicing fee is due to the land offices for the land registration procedure. With this provision, the activity of the land offices became servicing, a kind of service that is paid by the clients. The transition to fee-collection went successfully in the land administration sector, without causing any break in the case management; they decided about the applications according to the new rules from the moment they stepped into force.

Recently, two governmental decisions have been proposed. One can be read in the bill No. T/1202, submitted on 3rd November 2006, the other one was communicated by the Government on the 22nd November. The Bill – modifying more than thirty Acts – would delete the expression “land office” from the text of rules of law, changing it to “land affairs authority”. The intentions of the Government are not clear. Seemingly, the Government wishes to be entitled for establishing one or more land affairs authorities. But why? Whether they wish to pave the way with all these to the division of the uniform land registration system?

All changes disturb the usual order of case management, they always cause temporary confusion. The name ‘land office’ is well known by now in Hungary, and the image of an operable system is connected to that term. There is no need to completely reorganize the land administration sector, which is responsible for land and property registration; the change of names does not bring any positive result either.

The other decision relates to financing. From 2007 on, the land administration would not receive any support from central budget. The servicing fee would increase from HUF 5000 to HUF 6000. In the practice, it would not mean an unbearable burden on the clients. But there is an important question: will everybody pay who requests the services of the land offices? The answer is negative. The Act on Fees provides subjective and objective exemptions. The organizations of the central budget, the local governments and the bailiffs of the court do not pay. The other clients will cover the costs of the service used by them.

The exemption from fees connected to the distraint procedure of bailiffs of the court means State support given to the enforcement of debts, while its content and form is not justified by anything. Why the support and why through the land offices?

This is not a real argument against collecting fee from the organizations within the State budget that in this case the State would put the money from one pocket into the other. It is a requirement against any “pocket” that it has to economize efficiently. The principles and methods for that purpose are available in the business life. While paying the countervalue of any service, the relations become transparent and treatable by accountancy. All “pockets” need to use its resources reasonably. The “free-of-charge” status does not make anybody do it.

The undisturbed land transactions are of basic common interest. Only the raising of the level of State service provided for that can justify any change. While making the decision, we should be aware that in land and property affairs, the questions relating to law, technology and often utilization of agricultural land usually emerge at the same time. For me it is quite evident that the tasks of public administration can be solved with the greatest efficiency in the current uniform system. The land administration has to go on with the electronic case management for improving the efficiency and the legal security. Services should be provided on equal conditions both for the players of business life, the citizens and the organizations of the State budget.  

 
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