Record series
General Law Plans of Subdivision Index Cards
VPRS 19217
1945 - 1988
Open
North Melbourne
Agencies
This record series was created by:
Agencies responsible for this record series: Date Range
Series date range: 1945 - 1988
Series in custody:
1945 - 1988
Contents in custody:
1945 - 1988
Function / Content
This series consists of index cards that provide access to the General Law Plans of Subdivision (VPRS 19161).The purpose of the General Law Plans of Subdivision was to show the division of a parcel of General Law land into two or more parcels. The plans were deposited with the Registrar General’s Office (RGO) between 1946 and 1983, by the relevant local municipal council, after approval of an application for subdivision of General Law land. The significance of this date range is unknown. Unlike the subdivisions under the Torrens system, the plans were not approved by the RGO. The plans were deposited at the RGO to support General Law property transactions, as the subdivisions would been given affect in subsequent deeds. References are often made to the plans of subdivision in other records series documenting General Law land ownership.
The index cards in this series are arranged by the Parish name in which the parcel of land is located. The index provides one or more subdivision numbers over a crown parcel of land.
The first land tenure system to be introduced into Victoria in March 1838 was called the 'General Law' or 'Old Law System', or more commonly called today, NUA (Not Under Act). Land under the Torrens system (Real Property Act 1862) was therefore 'under Act'. This system was directly based on the principles of the English Common Law.
Under the General Law system, land ownership was based on a set of deeds, being the original deed held by the owner and a Memorial which was generally registered at the RGO. These documents helped prove ownership back to the Crown Grant, although there was no compulsion under this system to register the Memorial with the RGO.
Title was proven by producing the collection of deeds, which was commonly called the ‘Chain of Title’ held by successive owners, as well as a search of the Memorials lodged at the RGO. A Memorial is a copy of the original deed. Every time land changed hands, the chain of deeds needed to be produced and a new deed / Memorial needed to be drawn up by lawyers. It was a cumbersome and expensive system, in which the risk of deeds being lost or destroyed was high. Land ownership in the General Law system was and is still not guaranteed by the Victorian Government.
The introduction of the Torrens system in Victoria on 2 October 1862, made legislative provisions under the Transfer of Land Act for owners of General Law land to voluntarily convert their land to the Torrens system of land ownership. Although the expectation was that all land would be brought under the operation of the Transfer of Land Act fairly quickly, this did not prove to be the case. In the mid-1980s, after 120 years of operation of the Torrens system, large areas of land remained under the General Law system. The registration of Memorials continued until the 31 December 1998 when the register was closed. This was an effort to help speed up the Conversion process, as all new land transactions would have to be conducted under the Transfer of Land Act following an application to convert the deed into a certificate of title.
Most marketable parcels of land under the General law ownership have now been converted to the Torrens system.
How to use the records
To access this series, researchers need to know the name of the Parish in which the parcel of land of interest is located. Each box of index cards is titled with a letter range, e.g. A-B, in which index cards are stored alphabetically by Parish name.The index cards are searched first in alphabetical Parish / Township order, then by Section and Allotment numeric order. This will allow a researcher to obtain the ‘PS’ number which provides access to the General Law Plans of Subdivision.
Recordkeeping system
The index cards are stored in alphabetical order by Parish / Township name, then in numerical order by Section and Allotment / Portion.Each entry provides a ‘PS’ number which can be used to access the equivalent file in VPRS 19161 General Law Plans of Subdivision. Researchers should note that in VPRS 19161 the prefix ‘GL’ is used instead of ‘PS’, however the numbers are the same across both series. For example, PS12345 and GL12345 refer to the same Plan of Subdivision.
