Committee Reports > List of Committees > Dáil > 1951 > Committee of Public Accounts > Report - Appropriation Accounts 1948 - 1949

APPENDIX XXXII.

REGISTERS AND RENTALS OF STATE LANDS AND BUILDINGS.

An Rúnaí,

Coiste um Chuntais Phoiblí.

With reference to paragraph 4 of the Report of the Committee of Public Accounts on the Appropriation Accounts, 1944/45, relative to the compilation of complete registers and rentals of all State lands and buildings administered by the Commissioners of Public Works, I enclose a statement of the progress that has been made in the work during the period from its initiation up to 31st March, 1950.

It is proposed, for the future, to furnish an account of the progress that has been made in the work during each financial year until its completion.

Compilation of Property Rental.

The compilation of the Property Rental was commenced in 1939/40 on an experimental basis, with a staff of 1 Surveyor, 1 Solicitor and 1 Executive Officer; in 1943/44 the Department of Finance sanctioned the Commissioners’ proposals for the appointment to the service of a balanced staff, i.e., 4 Surveyors, 1 Solicitor and 3 units of secretariat staff, viz. 1 Executive Officer, 1 Clerical Officer and 1 Writing Assistant. The service falls into three main branches, viz., Mapping, Legal and Secretariat work, but it is to be noted that the following outline of the work involved, and the progress made, in each of these branches does not have regard to the task of keeping the completed Rental up to date.

Mapping:

This entails in the first instance a special survey of each property and the assembly of all data necessary to enable accurate and detailed site maps and floor plans to be prepared; these drawings form the basis of “Key Maps” on which the title and utilisation of the properties can be plotted,

Progress in this branch of the work has suffered considerably from the difficulty experienced in recruiting staff and retaining them. All the properties in Cos. Louth, Clare, Roscommon, Waterford, Offaly and Cavan, to a total of 338, have been surveyed and mapped, and at the 31st March, 1950, work was in progress in respect of the 280 properties in Cos. Wicklow, Galway, and Kildare. From the initiation of the survey work up to the 31st March, 1950, a total of 493 properties have been surveyed of which 463 have been mapped.

Legal:

The preliminary and final legal work has been completed for all the 290 properties in Cos. Louth, Clare, Roscommon, Waterford, and Offaly; the preliminary legal work, viz, the examination of all title documents, abstracting such of them as are current, and preparing epitomes of the titles, has also been completed for Cos. Cavan, Galway, Wicklow, Carlow, Kildare and Leix (427 properties), and is in progress for the 182 properties in Co. Donegal. Staff problems in the Secretariat branch have, however, held up the final legal work in respect of 48 properties in Co. Cavan, and 101 properties in Cos. Galway and Kildare which have been mapped. This final legal work involves consideration of the action, if any, to be taken in regard to irregularities, particularly discrepancies between the configuration and limits of the properties as described in the title deeds and those actually revealed by the survey and mapping. It will be seen that the preliminary legal work has progressed considerably in advance of the other two branches of the Service as the latter have been retarded by staff difficulties.

Secretariat:

In the compilation of the Rental the work of the Secretariat falls into three parts, viz.:—

(1) listing, county by county, all properties (to a total of about 2,500) administered by the Commissioners and arranging the properties in each county into the “groups” that will enable the field work, i.e., mapping and perambulation, to be carried through economically and in the most expeditious manner;

(2) carrying out the research work which is a necessary preliminary to the actual surveys: this work involves an examination of all available file records relating to each property, to supplement the information that can be derived from the title deeds, and to enable the Surveyors to be fully briefed prior to the surveys and instructed as to any matters which may call for special attention on their part on the occasions of the surveys.

(3) the assembly of the final Rental Record in respect of the properties. This Record consists of envelopes arranged on the card index principle supplemented by loose-leaf registers. Each envelope relates to a single property, contains the relevant maps, plans, etc., and shows on its face the location and extent of the property with the epitome of title and brief particulars of utilisation; the loose-leaf registers are arranged on a Departmental basis, and describe in more complete detail the utilisation, etc., of the properties.

The work on (1) has been completed, while on (2) it has proceeded pari-passu with the mapping work. The position so far as (3) is concerned is that the work has been completed for Cos. Louth, Clare, Roscommon, Waterford and Offaly (290 properties); staffing difficulties have, however, retarded progress in respect of Cos. Galway and Kildare that have been surveyed and mapped.

perambulation.

This service is closely associated with the compilation of the Rental, and at the outset it was envisaged that properties would be perambulated periodically by the Commissioners’ local architects only according as they were surveyed and included in the Rental. Since 1947-48, however, systematic perambulation of all properties administered by the Commissioners, whether surveyed in detail or not, has been in progress in as full a manner as circumstances permit. A card index of all the properties and perambulation time tables were prepared, firstly to secure that each property would be brought under notice for perambulation at the appropriate time, and secondly to provide a check that each property was in fact perambulated at that time, and that steps were being taken towards the requisite action regarding any point calling for action to which the perambulation might give rise.