First Tier is Here

The Leasehold Tribunal (LVT) has now become the First-Tier Tribunal (Property Chamber), under the auspices of the Ministry of Justice. Siobhan McGrath, who was the Senior President of the Residential Property Tribunal Service since December 2000, is the President of the new Property Chamber.

The new Property Chamber brings together Rent Assessment Committees, Leasehold Valuation Tribunals, Residential Property Tribunals, Rent Tribunals, Agricultural Land Tribunals and the jurisdiction of the Adjudicator to HM Land Registry.

The Chamber is divided into three key areas: Residential Property, Land Registration and Agricultural Land & Drainage.

A new set of procedural rules, The Tribunal Procedure (First-Tier Tribunal) (Property Chamber) Rules 2013 has also come into force. The new rules provide the Property Chamber with greater powers than were previously available to them, and introduce the concept of an Overiding Objective to deal with cases “fairly and justly”. Also, there are now powers to strike out a party’s case, make costs orders including in cases where a party has “acted unreasonably”, and manage a case more robustly.

Originally, when the LVT began it was intended to be an informal forum for resolving residential disputes. In its new identity, the Property Chamber is now a more formal, structured part of the Justice system and it will be interesting to see what impact, if any, this will have on its users.