Town and Country Planning Act 1990

162 Power of mortgagees to serve blight notice

(1) Where the whole or part of a hereditament or agricultural unit is comprised in blighted land and a person claims that—

(a) he is entitled as mortgagee (by virtue of a power which has become exercisable) to sell an interest in the hereditament or unit, giving immediate vacant possession of the land;

(b) he has made reasonable endeavours to sell that interest; and

(c) in consequence of the fact that the hereditament or unit or a part of it was, or was likely to be, comprised in blighted land, he has been unable to sell that interest except at a price substantially lower than that for which it might reasonably have been expected to sell if no part of the hereditament or unit were, or were likely to be, comprised in such land,

then, subject to the provisions of this section, he may serve on the appropriate authority a notice in the prescribed form requiring that authority to purchase that interest to the extent specified in, and otherwise in accordance with, this Chapter.

(2) Subject to subsection (3), subsection (1) shall apply in relation to an interest in part of a hereditament or unit as it applies in relation to an interest in the whole of a hereditament or unit.

(3) Subsection (2) shall not enable a person—

(a) if his interest as mortgagee is in the whole of a hereditament or agricultural unit, to make any claim or serve any notice under this section in respect of any interest in part of the hereditament or unit; or

(b) if his interest as mortgagee is only in part of a hereditament or agricultural unit, to make or serve any such notice or claim in respect of any interest in less than the whole of that part.

(4) Notice under this section shall not be served unless the interest which the mortgagee claims he has the power to sell—

(a) could be the subject of a notice under section 150 served by the person entitled to it on the date of service of the notice under this section; or

(b) could have been the subject of such a notice served by that person on a date not more than six months before the date of service of the notice under this section.

(5) Subject to sections 151(7) and 159(2) and (3), the grounds on which objection may be made in a counter-notice under section 151 to a notice under this section are those specified in paragraphs (a) to (c) of subsection (4) of that section and, in a case to which it applies, the grounds specified in paragraph (d) of that subsection and also the following grounds—

(a) that, on the date of service of the notice under this section, the claimant had no interest as mortgagee in any part of the hereditament or agricultural unit to which the notice relates;

(b) that (for reasons specified in the counter-notice) the claimant had not on that date the power referred to in subsection (1)(a);

(c) that the conditions specified in subsection (1)(b) and (c) are not fulfilled;

(d) that (for reasons specified in the counter-notice) neither of the conditions specified in subsection (4) was, on the date of service of the notice under this section, satisfied with regard to the interest referred to in that subsection.