It had long been the case that an equitable mortgage or charge could be created by the deposit of title documents. Such deposit had always been held to give the mortgagee a lien on the land to which the deeds relate as opposed to merely having a lien on the deeds themselves.

The Supreme Court has recently given judgment on the complex inter-action of the Local Registration of Title (Ireland) Act 1891 (“the 1891 Act”), the Registration of Title Act 1964 (“the 1964 Act”) and the Registration of Deeds and Title Act 2006 (“the 2006 Act”). In particular, the Court outlined one of the implications of the 2006 Act on the practice of creating equitable mortgages by deposit of title documents. The Court held that the proper construction of the 2006 Act is such that it must be taken to have been the statutory intention to bring, by the expiry of the relevant three year period, a complete end to the system of lien by deposit of a land certificate in respect of registered land. 

I set out below a link to the case. (The links works best from a Personal Computer.)