Data Matching with the Land Register

Having established a database on community ownership in Scotland and then having tried to verify the information held with the community groups themselves it was decided to verify it with the Land Register in conjunction with Registers of Scotland. This would not only allow the data held to be verified but also missing data such as land area and transfer data to be populated.

The Land Register was introduced in 1981 and is based on the Ordnance Survey map. It provides property owners with a state-backed guarantee of title. The Land Register is a replacement for the paper based General Register of Sasines.

Transactions were added to the Land Register as opposed to the Sasine Register at different points of time based on where the transaction took place in Scotland. Counties moved to the Land Register from 1981 until 2014. Further information on Land Register counties and operational dates can be found on the Registers of Scotland website.

The main issues with the database on community ownership surrounded missing or unverified data on:

• The area of assets
• The location of assets
• The date of purchase or transfer of assets

For those assets on the Land Register, Registers of Scotland were able to populate the missing variables or verify the information already held. For those assets that remain on the Sasine Register it was not possible to populate the missing variables or verify the information already held. For these assets, the transfer date is defaulted to 2000. It should be noted that it is likely that the extent of community ownership in 2000 will be overestimated as a result.

Through the matching process and discussions with Registers of Scotland, a number of issues were identified that affected the level of data verification that could be undertaken:

General Register of Sasines

• The Sasine Register is not a map based system
• If an asset is in the Sasine Register, it is likely to have last changed hands prior to the relevant county transferring to the Land Register
• Prior to 8 December 2014 and the enactment of the Land Registration etc. (Scotland) Act 2012, it was possible to continue to register any transaction that constituted a gift, or any transfer that was for no cost or for a non‑monetary value in the Sasine Register

Land Register

• For transactions that were for Certain Good and Onerous Causes and registered on or after 2012 the Land Register contains the market value of the property at the time of registration
• For transactions prior to 8 December 2014, when the Land Registration etc. (Scotland) Act 2012 was enacted, for any title greater than 2 hectares, the area of the asset would be included. After this date the area of any property greater than 0.5 hectares is given. This recording convention had led to a large number of assets with small areas, in many cases existing buildings, having their area either recorded as zero or not available
• Titles can be in draft on the Land Register. This means that the land/property has been sold, Registers of Scotland have a received a transaction for that land/property, Registers of Scotland have created a title, and it is in the process of being registered. This could take two days or several years depending on the complexity of the application
• In certain cases, one asset may be split into multiple titles on the Land Register. This is due to mapping and registration processes within Registers of Scotland. For any asset where this has happened the asset is classed as a single entry on the community ownership database as it was purchased at one time
• It is possible for an asset which is currently on the Sasine Register to be voluntarily recorded on the Land Register, for example, in order to resolve a legal technicality. When an asset is voluntarily added to the Land Register the registration date entered will be the date of the voluntary registration. The price paid may also appear as a non-monetary transaction. Therefore, in these cases the date of ownership or price paid as recorded on the Sasine Register or provided by the original data source are retained

Other issues surrounding the classification of assets and how they are recorded on the Land Register were also identified:

• Where land adjacent to an existing asset is acquired, it is possible for the title number of that existing asset to be updated to include the additional land rather than recording it under a separate title number. In these cases, whilst there is only one title number, the additional land is counted as a separate asset as it was acquired through a separate transaction
• Where adjacent assets are acquired in separate transactions and have separate title numbers, they will be recorded as individual assets, regardless of whether the asset owner subsequently combines them, e.g. constructs a single building on the whole site. Should this building then be transferred to another community group, it would then be considered a single asset

While there is no identifier on the Land Register to indicate that an asset is community owned, a small number of additional entries were found where the name of the owner suggested it was a community group. These groups and assets then underwent further investigation to establish if they did indeed meet the criteria to be included in the database on community ownership.

Going forward all new land based community owned assets that the Scottish Government are made aware of will be matched and verified with the Land Register.

As the Land Register is map based, Registers of Scotland are able to calculate the area of assets where the area figure was not available and the asset has been found on the Land Register. Registers of Scotland are able to calculate the areas of these assets using the extent of the title polygons associated with these assets. These calculated area figures were then included for the first time in the Community Ownership in Scotland 2020 publication. The area for all land based community owned assets on the Land Register are now calculated using the extent of the associated title polygons.

Using the extent of the associated title polygons to calculate the areas of these assets may potentially result in an overestimate of the area for some assets. For example, a title plan might have a right of access associated with it, but this does not mean that the ownership of the area relating to the right of access belongs to that title. To avoid, where possible, an overestimate of the area in community ownership those assets with an area over 0.5 hectares will be examined in more detail. Where titles are found to include areas that are not owned, the area figures will be adjusted so that only the areas actually owned by community groups will be included. This examination will also likely lead to the asset types of a small number of assets being updated to more accurately reflect their use.

The remaining land based assets, where no area figures are available, are on the paper based Sasine Register. While it has been possible to source the area of most assets on the Sasine Register from different sources, mostly the community groups themselves, it has not yet been possible to sources the area for these remaining assets from another source.

There can be a small number of assets that are on Land Register where the area is unknown when a new edition of the Community Ownership in Scotland publication is published. In these cases, the assets were matched against the Land Register late in the publication process. As a result, there was insufficient time for the area of the asset to be calculated using the extent of the associated title polygons before the data was finalised for inclusion in the publication. The area for these assets will be calculated and included in the next edition of the Community Ownership in Scotland publication series.