Commons Bill [HL]

If I have understood the noble Lord, Lord Livsey, correctly, he intends that Amendment No. 81B would enable the revival of certain rights of common held before 1967, but which were not registered during the initial wave of registrations under the Commons Registration Act 1965. The noble Lord cited a particular case involving Crown land. I am sure he will not be surprised if I say that I am not going to be able to comment on the circumstances of an individual case. I offer to consider further the points he seeks to raise using that case as an illustration, but I cannot offer to do anything to resolve the particular case. Even if I were to do so, it would not be helpful since I am not a lawyer. The position on rights which existed before 1967 but which were unregistered for any reason is that those rights were extinguished from 31 July 1970. Some organisations representing commoners have asked for provision to enable some such rights to be revived by means of registration under the Bill. However, we think that it is really too late to attempt to resuscitate the body of rights which was extinguished some 35 years ago. We have said that in the context of inflated rights registered under the 1965 Act, and I will repeat it in the context of rights lost under that same Act, that 35 years is a long time and I do not think it would be right to create a new opportunity to try to claim those rights now. As I have said, I am prepared to look to see whether there is anything we could say that might be helpful in any way, but I cannot offer to resolve the particular case that the noble Lord brought to our attention. I hope that he will accept that a line does have to be drawn in the sand somewhere and that he will feel able to withdraw the amendment.