Attorney calls for land court to address mounting disputes

WESTERN BUREAU:

Attorney-at-law Gloria Brownand is calling for a specialised land court to tackle Jamaica’s growing backlog of property disputes, arguing that cases involving the country’s most valuable resource are taking too long to be resolved.

Brown, a former host of ‘Land Solutions’ on Power 106 FM, made the call while was delivering the keynote address at a recent World Habitat Day Conference in Montego Bay.

She said the dedicated court would tackle the growing volume and complexity of land cases.

“The reality is that a lot of our judges are not well versed in land law. Many of them are coming out of the DPP’s (director of public prosecutions) office ... They have a criminal [law] background, so we find the land matters are taking too long, and there are just too many land matters,” she said.

Brown, a senior partner at Brown, Findley and Company, said the prolonged resolution of land disputes is particularly troubling given the importance of land to home ownership, investment, development, and economic security.

“I think a specialist land court – like we have a traffic court, a gun court – we need a land court. Land is crucial to Jamaicans, so we need to do something,” she said.

REASSESSMENT NEEDED

She argued that Jamaica needs to reassess its approach to land administration and draw on lessons from previous initiatives to develop a more comprehensive solution.

“We can look at what was there for Operation Pride. We can look at the sites and service situation. We can look at LAMP (the Land Administration and Management Programme). We need to bring all these things together. We have been too piecemeal when it comes to land,” she said.

Brown also criticised municipal corporations and planning authorities over what she described as inadequate enforcement of development regulations, arguing that they need to intervene before unauthorised construction becomes entrenched.

“Why it is that we only enforce when there is a problem?” she asked. “A man did not put up a three-storey building overnight, and the persons who work at the parish council, many of them live in the same communities.”

Brown said property owners have repeatedly sought help from local authorities over alleged construction on their land without seeing sufficient action.

“I have seen so many clients who have gone to parish council saying somebody is building on my land. They go, and nothing is done. So we need to know what exactly the parish council are doing in terms of enforcement,” she said.

Brown also linked Jamaica’s land problem to growing inequality, arguing that increasing pressure on available property is making it more difficult for poorer Jamaicans to secure suitable land.

“The marginal lands are now being used up, and the reality is that the poor are being pushed out of the urban areas into marginal areas,” she said, while warning that the failure to address access to land could fuel further squatting and social tensions.

“So squatting is going to be a part of what is going to stay with us, you know, because there is, indeed, a problem. There is, indeed, a problem, and we need to look to see how we’re going to solve this problem,” she said.

Brown said Jamaica must act before the land problem becomes even more difficult to manage.

“We have to solve the situation or else we are going to have a Coopers Pen multiplying all over Jamaica because there’s something that God is not making any more of, and that is land,” she added.

albert.ferguson@gleanerjm.com