All posts by Mark

The problem with the EU Common Agricultural Policy – TLIO information briefing

Cap Welfare Payments to the Rich!

Reinventing a Common Agricultural Policy for ecological, economic & social sustainability.

The current Common Agricultural Policy (C.A.P) agreement between the members of the EU exists to distribute agricultural subsidies to the farming industry across Europe.

What are the origins of C.A.P? The Common Agricultural Policy (C.A.P.) was set up by the founders of the European Community in the aftermath of WW2 to stabilise food supplies and guarantee fair incomes for farmers.

 

The problem

In recent years, the system of subsidies changed to one based on how much land is owned or cultivated, rather than the amount of crops produced. Under this change to a system called Single-Farm Payments, though effective in reducing over production, landowners now get paid for owning land. Landowners get between £60 & £90 per acre, with the only provision to maintain the land appropriately which currently amounts to occasional maintenance. Whereas the bulk of subsidies have always gone to those who own the most land, the reforms have intensified this situation.

The CAP has also been monopolised by wealthy, landed interests, particularly in Britain where 2/3rds of its 60m acres are, rather amazingly, owned by only 0.26% of the population. Of that, the vast majority is owned by the even more astonishingly small number of just 1200 individuals. Some of the biggest recipients are able to use the money received to buy more land year-on-year and so get ever larger subsidies. Between 2005 and 2011 the number of landholdings in England fell by 10%, while the average size of holding rose by 12%. Landowning benefits of using land as an increasing store of wealth are obvious – farmland is exempt from inheritance tax so it pays to buy up farms to avoid tax.

In some cases landlords renting land out pocket the subsidy for land actually worked by tenant farmers! Like the farcical trade in milk quotas, it has also given rise to a trade in those subsidies which has more in common with the failed financial sector than the honest intentions of the original treaty.

The C.A.P. welfare bonus
Under the ‘Single-Farm Payment’ system of distributing agricultural subsidies, in the UK, huge annual C.A.P. payments and other financial aid went out to –

– the Duke of Buccleuch £549,000, the Duke of Westminster £532,144, Lord Carrington £149,000, to MP’s, for example Richard Drax MP got £417,846 in financial year 2010-11, to dukes, earls… to Prince Charles £581,000 …

H.M.Queen was paid £1,183,508 C.A.P. over 2 years (08 & 09) for privately-owning Sandringham.

Tate and Lyle received Euros 829,975,239 in payments between 1999 and 2011 (source: farmsubsidies.org)

In 2010, 709 UK recipients got more than £250,000, 133 were given at least £500,000 and 47 received more than a million pounds.

Owners of bulk land – especially agri-businesses, plc corporations and giant food processors – get the lions share of CAP money. In 2009, one £81m cheque went to British Sugar plc. Unilever, Nestle, RSPB, banks, distillers, get £millions. Meanwhile, whilst large farms sell at rock-bottom prices, farmers with small capacity struggle with tight margins in a marketplace dominated by actors who wield disproportionate power (ie. supermarkets and processors).

Since 2010, details of individuals’ holdings have been removed by Defra from the web site – due to objections.

The Case for a new Agricultural Policy in the UK
Reforming the CAP should focus on one of the original tenets of the Treaty of Rome to “ensure the optimum utilisation of the factors of production, in particular, labour“. Britain holds the smallest percentage of agricultural workers in the world, and that workforce is an ageing workforce. A third of one percent of the population, some 116,000 people, work the land. The inequitous subsidy system combined with our vertically-integrated food system driven by the corporate sector leaves the UK with a deserted countryside and vapid rural society/economy.

Structural reforms to the CAP subsidy system for agriculture would divert funds away from barley barons to small farms, allowing them to once again thrive in a competitive marketplace. There should be an upward limit on subsidies – no subsidies for large farmers, possibly with the exception of organic agriculture. And subsidies should be conditional on farmers practicing low-input agriculture to limit environmental externalities of modern farming methods (eg: pesticide use).

Subsidies for Sustainable Agriculture

Small farms almost always produce more output per unit area than large ones. This holds true, both in rich countries and the majority world.  The “inverse relationship between farm size and output” is now widely recognized by agronomists across the political spectrum, Barret, 1993; Ellis, 1993; Tomich et al., 1995; all agree on this point.

Whereas, large farms tend to monoculture because of heavy machinery and the rigidity of big systems, the greater flexibility and attention to detail inherent in small farms enables far more  mixing, combining and rotation of crops and livestock, with manure and compost replenishing soil fertility (denuded fertility is a huge, looming issue across the EU).

Small farms are by far the most successful and environmentally desirable model of agriculture. Preserving and increasing their numbers should be the highest priority of agricultural policy. Instead we have a system that subsidises the wealthiest in society, distorts markets and encourages the concentration of land in fewest hands.

This is the opposite of CAP’s original aim.

Our Solution

There is a new constituency of aspiring farmers with a real awareness of the wider social and environmental impact of how we use the land. They need to be able to access land and an appropriate level of subsidy, so they can deliver positive impacts on food quality and security, the rural economy and the environment.

CAP, along with land redistribution, could be tailored to bring about a new dawn in British farming. These are the issues TLIO campaigns on.

The Land is Ours proposes that:

  •  Only those directly engaged in agricultural production should get subsidies, with an upper limit equal to the national average income;
  • National conservation bodies and branches of government involved in conservation and other desirable C.A.P. funded activities should receive equivalent national funding from the money saved;
  • All payments should be conditional on more exacting, rigorous standards of land management, including measures to protect nature, forbid harmful land management, protect important landscape and cultural assets, beneficial standards of animal welfare and sustainable food production, and for suitable land to be used for food and other natural resource production;
  •  A maximum payment should apply to private landowners (but not for publicly owned land), to prevent payments for conservation becoming a loophole that provides subsidy to the land-rich purely for owning acres.

These measures would help keep prices reasonable for consumers.  Safe, healthy food raised properly is a basic human right and is deserving of state support.

Now is the time to exert pressure on policy-makers and re-direct the money towards genuinely sustainable production.  Far-reaching land redistribution is required to make this effective.  So let us also take back our true and just inheritance – the Earth and all that grows on it.  The Land is Ours!

What You Can Do:

  • Write to your M.P.
  • Copy your letter and any replies to our website.
  • Distribute this leaflet in your area, available from info@tlio.org.uk

Some positive suggestions for reform of CAP have also emerged here: http://www.europeanfooddeclaration.org/

Sources of INFORMATION  on  C.A.P. PAYMENTS in U.K.
www.cap-payments.defra.gov.uk
farmsubsidy.org/  for payments across Europe.
Produced by The Land Is Ours www.tlio.org.uk

The long-term trend of cultural apartheid against the gypsy & travelling community

The long-term trend of cultural apartheid against the gypsy & travelling community through subjective discriminatory intepretation of changing government policy over the years started with local authorities’ enthusiastic adherance to implementing section 23 of the ‘1968 Caravan Sites & Control of Development Act’ which gave powers to close commons to travellers whilst section 24 of the same act to provide traveller sites was ignored. It resulted in long-running displacement and ostracisation of the culturally diverse gypsy & travelling community.

The ghettoisation of the travelling community to marginal bits of land around the country (due in part to long-term population dynamics which is a consideration in a densely populated island like the UK), and in some cases, the abandonment of a cultural lifestyle and retreat to conventional housing stepped up a gear with the passing of the Criminal Justice & Public Order Act 1994 by the Conservative Government, which repealed the duty of local authorities to provide sites, who publicly stated that “gypsies and travellers should buy their own land”. However, many travellers were excluded from access to a planning process subject to highly complex procedures and a dearth of advice – with the result that many were stranded in legal terms and compelled to live on their own land without planning permission. Travellers across the country faced such impossible odds in actually receiving planning permission for Traveller sites over many years that there was estimated to have been an over 90% rate of refusal. The culmination of a wave of failed planning applications and the resulting enforcement actions occurred especially from the late 1990s onwards (there are many travellers who are said to have just walked away from land they purchased). It resulted in a spate of brutal and violent evictions across the country over recent years, most notably Woodside in 2003, Meadowlands in Essex in 2004 and Twin Oaks Caravan Park in Ridge in Hertfordshire in Jan 2005. See: http://www.advocacynet.org/ website for footage of previous evictions by Constant.

Dale Farm became a refuge in the last few years for families evicted from other sites. (see background info below for a brief more detailed historical overview of what’s happened at Dale Farm). Around 20% of the estimated 18,000 gypsy caravans in the UK are not accommodated on authorised sites.

Human Rights campaigner and advocate of Roma as well as Irish Travellers – Grattan Puxon: “Travellers should not have to live in constant fear of eviction with their lives and communities under constant threat. They should not have to be forced out of their homes and off their land by bulldozers and police. This constant hounding, marginalisation, and lack of provision is how rural England does ethnic cleansing. It is time for a resurgence of support for Gypsy and Traveller communities. Time to stand against the extreme racial discrimination faced by Gypsies and Travellers. Time to defend the right of Gypsies and Travellers to land, life, respect, and dignity.”

The travelling community is a culture that has long been discriminated in this country by successive governments and which, as a result, has seen subsequent generations from sections of the traveller community at friction with settled communities across the country as gypsies and travellers are left with no option but to park up on unauthorised sites or public land in areas where no authorised sites are available and there are no stopping places and where locating vacant sites to settle upon become rarer and rarer in ever decreasing circles as the years go by.

LINKS:

Travellers Advice Team at the Community Law Partnership: http://www.gypsy-traveller.org/your-rights/law/travellers-advice-team/

Irish Travellers Movement in Britain: http://www.irishtraveller.org.uk/

Traveller Solidarity: http://travellersolidarity.org/

Traveller Times: http://www.travellerstimes.org.uk/website/News.htm

Traveller Law Reform Project:http://www.travellerslaw.org.uk/

London Gypsy and Traveller Unit: http://www.lgtu.org.uk/

Advocacy Project: http://www.advocacynet.org/

 

Land Registry workers to stage 48-hour strike over privatisation plans

Land Registry workers to stage 48-hour strike over privatisation plans
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/may/06/land-registry-workers-48-hour-strike-privatisation-plans
On 14-15 May, a 48-hour strike by thousands of workers at the Land Registry is taking place over plans to privatise the 150-year-old agency, which is expected to lead to hundreds of job cuts.
Members of the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union will walk out in 14 locations across England and Wales.

Leaked documents show that in a Land Registry board meeting in March, the board had detailed discussions about the pros and cons of two types of privatisation under the heading “business strategy”, appearing to discuss a  KPMG presentation on the possibility of a private sector partner. The meeting did not consider the option of keeping the registry as a public asset.

Former executives from the body, that registers the ownership of land  and property in England and Wales, say that a sell-off “beggars belief” because it will allow the private sector to adjudicate on what can be conflicting interests between sellers, buyers, lenders and neighbours.

Taken from: “Privatisation: Another Disaster in the making” (by MICHAEL KAVANAGH, 29/04/2014, The Morning Star):

HM Land Registry has been a part of central government since its
creation in 1862, when it was formed to create security of title to
land as an impartial arm of the state.

The staff make quasi-judicial decisions on thousands of property
transactions on a daily basis and record and maintain the register
that contains details including house and land purchases, rights,
remortgages and other secured debts.

The Land Registry holds a large amount of personal and financial
information, including land ownership, price paid information and
details of third-party interests such as loans and court orders.

As a “trading fund” it makes no call on the taxpayer, as it is
entirely funded by transaction fees and — because it is so efficient —
it is able to pay a sizeable dividend to the Treasury on an annual
basis.

For 149 years it was part of the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) and predecessor departments. In 2013 machinery of government changes moved it to the Department of  Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) under Secretary of State Vince  Cable. Within BIS, the Land Registry is under the control of the shareholder executive, which also controls Ordnance Survey, the Met Office and Companies House.

Since the early 1970s the Land Registry has been subject to seven studies into possible privatisation. These studies, undertaken by both Conservative and Labour governments,  have each unequivocally concluded that privatisation would be utterly  wrong and against the public interest.

The most recent “feasibility study,” however, sought to answer the
question “how would you privatise HM Land Registry?” and was carried out following the coalition government’s 2010 comprehensive spending review. The then parent department, MoJ, commissioned the well-known  management consultants and privateers KPMG to carry out this study.

Coincidentally, several members of the shareholder executive hail from KPMG, including its chief Mark Russell.

The KPMG report, obtained by PCS under freedom of information,
concluded that the best way to privatise the Land Registry would be to  firstly vest it into a government-owned company, which — surprise  surprise — was one of the options contained within the government consultation, which closed on March 20. The other consultation options included a joint-venture partnership and contracting out almost the entire delivery side of the Land Registry.  Each of the options included the retention of a small office of the chief land registrar within government, to deal with statutory elements. This was an unsuccessful attempt to reassure the public and legal  profession that state guarantee of title and service levels would be protected.

The minister responsible is Michael Fallon, who was the main mover in government for the botched and ludicrous privatisation of Royal Mail. According to the PCS, Fallon gave assurances that the status quo is an option,  although this was not clearly stated in the consultation papers. The Law Society, high street solicitors, property search providers and the PCS were among the many voices who have voiced opposition to the notion of privatisation of the Land Registry.

PCS and others argue that this would affect the quality and accuracy
of service and the security of the data we collect and hold. They also argue that concurrent consideration on what Land Registry would look like, including under the government’s “digital by default” strategy, would inevitably force up the cost to the public and potentially put small high street conveyancing firms out of business.

 

 

 

Land Registry privatisation plan revealed

Land Registry workers to stage 48-hour strike over privatisation plans

Thousands of union members to walk out on 14-15 May as hundreds of jobs under threat from plans to privatise agency
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/may/06/land-registry-workers-48-hour-strike-privatisation-plans


The Guardian newspaper revealed online on Monday evening (05/05/2014) that government plans to privatise the Land Registry have been revealed in a leaked document.

Below is that article followed by one which was published in the Morning Star on 29th April 2014 written by Michael Kavanagh, president of the Public Service Union’s land registry group, in which he reveals that the group obtained a copy of the “feasibility study” written by well-known privateers KPMG – one of the world’s largest audit companies – under a freedom of information request. Coincidentally, several members of the shareholding executive  which currently run the Land Registry within the government department for Business, Innovation & Skills (BIS) come from KPMG.

The minister responsible is Michael Fallon who was the main mover in government for the botched and ludicrous privatisation of Royal Mail. The Law Society, high street solicitors, property search providers and the PCS were among the many voices who have voiced opposition to the notion of privatisation.

In 2011, KPMG was named as the World’s Best Outsourcing Advisors, which basically recognizes their skills to help companies get rid of good paying staff positions and farming them out to lower-paying, often questionable companies. KPMG International Cooperative is a Swiss entity. It is the coordinating entity for a global network of independent firms in 146 countries employing 140,000 people. Each KPMG firm is separate and legally distinct. In 2005, KPMG in the United States admitted to criminal wrongdoing and agreed to pay $456 million in fines, restitution and penalties as part of an agreement to defer prosecution of the firm concerning a multi-billion-dollar criminal tax fraud conspiracy.

The PCS Alternative Vision for HM Land Registry (which surely is one supported by TLIO) makes the case that ‘the land register — currently covering around 80 per cent of the land in England and Wales — must be completed to create a quasi Domesday Book for the 21st century’.

Kavanagh: “This would allow for a proper public debate on land ownership and pave the way for regulation of the planning of land use in the future, something which the Land Registry could carry out for the public good.”
(..I would add, so that all land is covered; of course privatisation would make that even more unlikely and information requests no doubt more expensive).
M

Land Registry privatisation plans revealed in leaked document
by Rajeev Syal, The Guardian online
Monday 5th May 2014
Ref: http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/may/05/land-registry-privatisation-plans-revealed

Former chief land registrar and unions express concern about possibility of private firms having a say in granting of land rights

The Land Registry is headed towards privatisation, in a move which will give private firms a say in the granting of land rights, according to leaked minutes from a meeting of its board members.

Former executives from the body, that registers the ownership of land and property in England and Wales, say that a sell-off “beggars belief” because it will allow the private sector to adjudicate on what can be conflicting interests between sellers, buyers, lenders and neighbours.

Documents seen by the Guardian show that far from still considering public ownership of the 150-year-old body as a viable option – as ministers publicly claim – senior civil servants are deciding between a joint venture between the government and a private company, or letting a private company run it as a so-called Govco.

Michael Fallon, the business minister responsible, had stated that options would be put out for a public consultation before any decision was made – and this would include the option of retaining the Land Registry as an executive agency of government.

Conservative ministers are in favour of a joint venture, sources say. But the Guardian understands that Vince Cable, the business secretary, will block Tory moves towards a joint venture as he argues that the government must keep tighter control of any potential private sector partners.

The disclosures follow criticism over the Royal Mail sell-offand fears that the coalition is in a rush to privatise a number of assets.

Minutes show that civil servants believe the government could raise £1.225bn from entering a deal with a joint venture company, marginally higher than the £1.1bn GovCo evaluation and that the registry’s board has appointed their head of legal services as a company secretary for a new venture but have not yet announced it.

John Manthorpe, the former chief land registrar, said that the minutes appeared to show that the board was going ahead with a policy of privatisation.

“Appointing a company secretary gives the game away that the consultation may be a sham. I am not aware of any government department having a company secretary. The registry board are thinking in company terms already.

“It is clear that the management board, which has negligible experience and understanding of land registration and its important role, are solely fixed on the privatisation of this important state asset without any regard to the practical, financial or legal consequences for the citizen and business,” he said.

He said the government had recognised that the statutory powers of the Chief Land Registrar (CLR) could not be passed to the private sector and has therefore proposed a small “Office of the Chief Land Registrar”, passing the major operational work where the legal decisions are made regarding land rights on every property transaction in England and Wales to a private company.

The minutes, on 10 pages of A4, were recorded at a four-hour board meeting on 25 March, days after an initial consultation on a new service delivery company had been closed.

The meeting was held in a hotel in Selsdon Park Hotel in Croydon, south London, away from Rregistry staff.

Ed Lester, its chief executive and former head of the Student Loans Company, whose tax arrangements were criticised for being paid through a service company, was also present.

Under the heading “business strategy”, the board appeared to discuss a KPMG presentation on the possibility of a private sector partner. The minutes record how the capital return would be under three blocks and note that “NPV [net present value] equalling £1.225bn, marginally higher than the £1.1bn GovCO valuation”.

The minutes also note that under option two – the joint venture company – there may be “insufficient risk transfer to the PSP [private sector partner]” as well as a “significant risk of industrial action.”

But nowhere in the minutes does the board consider the possibility of keeping the body as an executive agency of government.

On 9 April, Fallon told parliament: “The proposals in the consultation on the introduction of a Land Registry service delivery company are being considered against the option of remaining as is, and no decisions will be taken until all responses have been considered.”

Minutes show that the board congratulated legal corporate head Mike Westott Rudd for becoming company secretary at the registry, a new post created by the board. They show that Lester travelled with a colleague to Norway, a trip which cost more than £1,000, to meet representatives of Infoland, which is state-owned but is moving into a privatisation process. The minutes record that “it is possible that it could be easily transportable to the UK and we could use it to replace our portal”.

Downing Street has expressed an interest in future Land Registry deals, the minutes show. “Norway are keen for us to global partner them. They are interested in Bangladesh, who have approached them, and No 10 want us to go to Tanzania”, they disclose.

The Land Registry has a monopoly in the homeowner market as all property buyers have to use its services.

It made a surplus of £98.7m in 2012-13, up from £86.1m the previous year, while revenue slipped by 3% to £347m.

Critics have pointed out that when the original January consultation document was published, the government had not consulted the registry’s principal professional customers: the Law Society, representing conveyancers, and the Council of Mortgage Lenders, representing banks and building societies.

Staff at the Land Registry are expected to announce a two-day strike over the potential privatisation after managers failed to give assurances over compulsory redundancies or office closures.

Mark Serwotka, the head of PCS union, said: “We are very concerned that, despite clear opposition from staff, lawyers and other professionals, the government is lining up the Land Registry for privatisation for purely political reasons.”

A spokesman for the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills said a decision would be made shortly on whether to privatise the registry and that all options remained under consideration.

“The company secretary role is in connection with the existing Land Registry board. It is a newly created position in order to meet recognised best practice on board governance.

“For years, Land Registry’s remit has included sharing knowledge and expertise with other countries to develop effective land administration systems and processes,” the spokesman said. “Ed Lester’s visit to Norway was in relation to their digital property portal and has nothing to do with considerations around commercial models.”

[end]
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Privatisation: Another Disaster in the making
Flogging off HM Land Registry could be the government’s next Royal Mail-type fiasco, writes MICHAEL KAVANAGH
29/04/2014, The Morning Star
Ref: http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-798d-Privatisation-Another-disaster-in-the-making#.U2gBXaL1VLo

HM Land Registry has been a part of central government since its creation in 1862, when it was formed to create security of title to land as an impartial arm of the state.

The staff make quasi-judicial decisions on thousands of property transactions on a daily basis and record and maintain the register that contains details including house and land purchases, rights, remortgages and other secured debts.

The Land Registry holds a large amount of personal and financial information, including land ownership, price paid information and details of third-party interests such as loans and court orders.

As a “trading fund” it makes no call on the taxpayer, as it is entirely funded by transaction fees and — because it is so efficient — it is able to pay a sizeable dividend to the Treasury on an annual basis.

It has also been able to reduce registration fees as a result of its success.

For 149 years it was part of the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) and predecessor departments.

In 2013 machinery of government changes moved it to the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) under Secretary of State Vince Cable.

Within BIS, the Land Registry is under the control of the shareholder executive, which also controls Ordnance Survey, the Met Office and Companies House.

Since the early 1970s the Land Registry has been subject to seven studies into possible privatisation.

These studies, undertaken by both Conservative and Labour governments, have each unequivocally concluded that privatisation would be utterly wrong and against the public interest.

The most recent “feasibility study,” however, sought to answer the question “how would you privatise HM Land Registry?”

The study was carried out following the coalition government’s 2010 comprehensive spending review.

The then parent department, MoJ, commissioned the well-known management consultants and privateers KPMG to carry out this study.

Coincidentally, several members of the shareholder executive hail from KPMG, including its chief Mark Russell.

The KPMG report, obtained by PCS under freedom of information, concluded that the best way to privatise the Land Registry would be to firstly vest it into a government-owned company, which — surprise surprise — was one of the options contained within the government consultation, which closed on March 20.

The other consultation options included a joint-venture partnership and contracting out almost the entire delivery side of the Land Registry.

Each of the options included the retention of a small office of the chief land registrar within government, to deal with statutory elements.

This was an unsuccessful attempt to reassure the public and legal profession that state guarantee of title and service levels would be protected.

The minister responsible, Michael Fallon — architect of Royal Mail privatisation — has assured PCS that the status quo is an option, although this was not clearly stated in the consultation papers.

The consultation has brought together a broad coalition hostile to any change of business model for the Land Registry, including the Law Society, high-street solicitors, property search providers, various other groups and, significantly, former chief land registrar John Manthorpe, who is widely regarded as one of the world’s leading authorities on land registration.

We are aware that there have been over 300 responses lodged with BIS and that the vast majority are extremely hostile to the notion of privatisation.

The publication Today’s Conveyancer even tacitly supported the notion of the Land Registry’s workforce taking industrial action to defend jobs and services.

The main reason that privatisation would be utterly wrong is that it would be impossible for a private company to retain the impartiality and integrity that currently exists.

Introduction of a profit motive would inevitably lead to different priorities.

PCS and others argue that this would affect the quality and accuracy of service and the security of the data we collect and hold.

We also argue that concurrent consideration on what Land Registry would look like, including under the government’s “digital by default” strategy, would inevitably force up the cost to the public and potentially put small high street conveyancing firms out of business.

Further, the PCS Alternative Vision For HM Land Registry, authored by Professor Roger Seifert, makes the case that the land register — currently covering around 80 per cent of the land in England and Wales — must be completed to create a quasi-Domesday Book for the 21st century.

This would allow for a proper public debate on land ownership and pave the way for regulation of the planning of land use in the future, something which the Land Registry could carry out for the public good.

We have also been pressing for the creation of a central register of landlords. None of the progressive opportunities would interest a private provider, whose sole interest would be the pursuit of profit.

It would appear, though, that the sound arguments we and others have put forward may not be sufficient on their own to prevent this government from hiving off the Land Registry to the private sector.

We have seen what has happened with Royal Mail and what is taking place within education and the National Health Service. This is a shameless act of transferring public assets into private pockets.

PCS members at the Land Registry know full well what is at stake here and we are gearing up for a programme of industrial and political action to defend this secure and widely respected public institution.

Michael Kavanagh is president of the Public Service Union’s land registry group.
[end]