Bankruptcy and Diligence etc. (Scotland) Act 2007

81 Land attachment

(1) There is to be a form of diligence over land to be known as land attachment.

(2) Land attachment is competent to enforce payment of a debt but only if—

(a) the debt is constituted by a decree or document of debt;

(b) the debtor has been charged to pay the debt;

(c) the period for payment specified in the charge has expired without payment being made; and

(d) where the debtor is an individual, the creditor has, no earlier than 12 weeks before registering the notice of land attachment, provided the debtor with a debt advice and information package.

(3) A land attachment is, subject to sections 83(6) and 121(1) of this Act, created at the beginning of the day which falls immediately after the expiry of the period of 28 days beginning with the day or, as the case may be, the last day on which a notice of land attachment in relation to the land is registered.

(4) During the period of 28 days referred to in subsection (3) above, the notice has effect as if it were an inhibition—

(a) registered against the debtor in the Register of Inhibitions; and

(b) restricted to the land described in the notice.

(5) A land attachment—

(a) confers on the creditor a subordinate real right over the land described in the notice (in this Chapter, the “attached land”); and

(b) secures the sum (in this Chapter, the “sum recoverable by the land attachment”) mentioned in subsection (6) below.

(6) That sum is—

(a) the sum for the payment of which the charge was served, together with any interest accruing after such service and before the attachment ceases to have effect; and

(b) all expenses which are chargeable against the debtor by virtue of the attachment.

(7) The Scottish Ministers may, by regulations—

(a) substitute for the period of 28 days referred to in subsection (3) above such other period; and

(b) make such amendment of enactments (including this Act) in consequence of such a substitution,

as they think fit.

(8) In this Act, “debt advice and information package” means the debt advice and information package referred to in section 10(5) of the Debt Arrangement and Attachment (Scotland) Act 2002 (asp 17) (in this Act, the “2002 Act”).