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Commons Bill [Lords]

I welcome the Government amendments, but I would be grateful if the Minister clarified something. In the helpful letter that he sent to most hon. Members—and certainly Committee members—he referred to the changes necessary to deal with the point I made in Committee about common land that was not registered but was common land by virtue of another enactment. Parcels of land have been classified as commons since the 13th century, but for one reason or another, some of them were not registered after the Commons Registration Act was passed in 1965. In Committee, we debated the fact that, as the law stands, they cannot be registered subsequently. Will the Minister confirm that when the Bill receives Royal Assent, all those commons, with the exception of the three that he named, can be registered under the 1965 Act as commons, so there is no doubt about their legal status in future?