Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, if he will review the length of time being taken by local authorities to process Local Authority Land Registry Searches; if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of imposing a maximum time limit for that processing; and if he will make a statement.

HM Land Registry is working with local authorities to transform the fragmented Local Land Charges services into a single national digital register across England and Wales as quickly as possible. The service offers instant online access helping users make quicker property related decisions. We have also set local authorities a target of ten working days to return local searches and nearly 88 per cent of authorities met this target this summer. We will continue to keep this performance under review.