Chancel Repair Liability and Registration
Chancel Repair Liability is the legal obligation to meet the cost of repairing the chancel of a parish church. It arises as a consequence of owning property formerly belonging to the rector of a parish. It only affects pre-Reformation Anglican and Welsh churches.
Liability can arise from ownership of land (either glebe, land awarded in lieu of a right to tithes, or land where the right to tithes has been merged in the land concerned). It can also arise from former ownership of a right to tithe in the form of tithe rentchage or other monetary payment. This guide gives only a brief summary of what is a complex legal subject and covers the principal ways from which liability originates.
It is the PCC that benefits from the liability and only the PCC can register the liability. There is no central church authority co-ordinating protection of the interest. The Legal Advisory Commission has issued an Opinion concerning the duty of the PCC to register.
Any PCC researching and registering liability, or a landowner investigating the subject should take appropriate legal advice.
The Durham Diocesan Registry has been researching this important subject and put together a set of guidelines which they have kindly given permission to download via this website - click here
The guidelines include a history of the subject and churches that currently have 'rentcharge liability' in the Durham Diocese.