Compensation for Land Lost Through Adverse Possession

The acquisition of land by adverse possession is a way in which a party who is not the legal owner of land can acquire legal title by virtue of possessing the land for a certain period of time pursuant to the provisions of the Limitation Act 1980 and the Land Registration Act 1925, or more recently, the Land Registration Act 2002.

The European Court of Human Rights has made a ruling recently in the case of J.A. Pye (Oxford) Ltd v. United Kingdom that the acquisition of registered land by adverse possession is in breach of Article 1 of Protocol 1 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which covers the entitlement to peaceful enjoyment of possessions. By a majority decision the Court held that Article 1 had been violated.