UNDER CONSTRUCTION
THE HYDRO EASEMENT - A FEUDAL REVIVAL
This page may be of interest to some individuals who are looking at the relationship between
Hydro schemes and their effects on land tenure in general. This page may also be of interest
to those groups who are interested in the effects of privatizing state held Hydro companies.
This page examines the relationship between land owners on subdivided areas surrounding a Hydro easement in Tasmania.
In particular it looks at a set of properties deliniated as belonging to plan 1192. This plan is held in the Tasmanian
Land Titles Office and the properties are all described by their title numbers (or folio numbers according to the Tasmanian
Land Titles Act 1980) being in the series 55391 etc... up to
This seems all very logical however if you look at the plan to the area encompassing the neighbouring
Hydro easement you can see that plan 1192 is actually included in the plan which encompasses the Hydro
easement.
This plan 52673 is then replaced by another plan, Balance Plan 53749.
It should be noted on the top left hand corner of this scan the "Reference" is fiven as CT 3195-27. This number
refers to the Certificate of Title for the whole area bordered in a dark line, in other words, the
whole area including all those properties described as folio 1192.
It should also be noted however that the area is described as not including "hatched portions" which means that CT 3195-27 is
what is known as a balance title or the area of land left once certain areas of a plan have been sold off.
CT 3195-27 is therefore Lot 1 on Plan 53749. This would appear to be a logical interpretation of this complex plan.
However if we look to the bottom left hand of CT 3195/27 we can see that there
is another lot 1 on Section M.
If we look at the title to Lot 1 on Section M we can see that this title to this individual lot of land
is now lot 1 on plan 5543... . However we can also see that the prior CT is described as 53749/1 or lot 1 on
plan 53749.
This points to a fundamental anomoly, Lot 1 on plan 53749 can be either an individual house lot or it could be
the entire balance title of approximately 21 ha of land.
It is also important to consider that the lots on plan 1192 are supposed to be completely seperate from any other
plans including that of the Hydro easement. However if a search of the new LIST system (a totally integrated system which
consolidates all information held on property in Tasmania) is made of folio 53749/1, the result below is achieved.
The search shows that the Hydro easement has been included among other folios which belong to plan 1192. The balance plan 53749/1 has
now been cancelled and a new folio 123455/1 has been created for the easement. The previous folio for 123455/1 is described as being
53749/1.
However a search of folio 123455/1 shows that this is not the case. The prior folio for 123455/1 is described as being 107138/1.
Further comment on the plans 52673 and 53749 should be made. Both plans have been printed out at exactly the same time, which seems to
be rather extraordinary and would lead one to ask whether the later plan has not just been compiled by scanning an altered photocopied version of
plan 52673.
The major point about this page is that this easement needs to be contained on its own plan and its own title with its own folio number, what
appears to be amazing is that proprietors of land in the surrounding area could under some circumstances appear in the Land Title Registry to
be owners of the easement itself due to the re-use of the folio number of the easement itself.
Study of these large Hydro easements and the surrounding properties is important mainly because of large hydro projects attract large amounts of
foreign capital. It is the potential for the placing and laundering of capital flight funds through dysfunctional land registration in areas around
these easements which need to be studied. Under certain circumstances, these large Hydro easements (or gas easements for that matter) can have a
disturbing effect on local tenures and a destabilizing effect on society in general unless the easements are carefully controlled on their own title.
It is not suggested that there is any form of wrong doing involved in how the properties in the area illustrated have been registered. However there is
a serious anomoly in how the title to the easement continues to dominate transactions in the surrounding areas.
MORE UNUSUAL EASEMENT REGISTRATIONS