Australia’s progress towards a single national e-conveyancing system is a step closer to reality following the setting up a new, government –backed development company.
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Notes From: Dinesh Weerakkody Barrister & Solicitor
E-conveyancing is about moving from a paper based system for title changes to an electronic system that is national, secure and seamless.
Every day over 3000 transactions occur that involve changes to land titles across Australia. Whether you are buying or selling a property, re-financing your mortgage or verifying who has an interest in your land, a change is made to your land title.
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The new National E-Conveyancing Development Ltd (NECDL) is chaired by lawyer Alan Cameron AM.
Cameron has six other non-executive directors joining him on the board of the new company, whose mission is to help establish a single national electronic conveyancing system.
Efforts to develop such a system have been going on for some years now under the guidance of a government-backed industry group known as the National Electronic Conveyancing Office (NECO).
But even with backing from both federal and state governments, it has proved extremely difficult to reach agreement on the basics of an electronic and on-line conveyancing system.
The institutional and vested interests involved in the traditional paper-intensive system for transferring formal ownership of land and real estate has proved extremely resistant to change.
Indeed a key question of whether technical components of the new system should be provided by the Victorian government’s e-conveyancing initiative remains largely un-resolved.
Nevertheless, after years of hard work developing technical standards by the NECO national steering committee and its various industry working groups, the e-conveyancing initiative is ready for its next step – actual implementation.
That will require some level of investment in computing and communications networks as well as other infrastructural components.
A formal company structure is better suited to managing and making those investments than NECO, which is why the new company has been set up.
Even so NECO and its work groups will continue as before during the transition period.
At this stage the governments of Australia’s three largest states – Queensland, NSW and Victoria – have come together to form the new company. The other five Australian state and territory governments are being promised the opportunity to join at a later date.
Industry groups, the Law Council of Australia and the Australian Bankers Association (ABA) have both welcomed the formation of the new company.
We have sourced information from the relevant statutory instruments, from much legal literature for this article including from eCommerce Report.
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