English real estate and conveyance law, which also became part of English colony law, was not entirely adapted to the conditions of the new settlements. In fact, its inadequacy was immediately apparent to anyone who cared to ponder the matter. The social and geographical conditions of the two countries were very different. English land law was designed to deal with social conditions that were unparalleled in early English colonies, such as those seen in New South Wales. In particular, in early New South Wales there was no substantial and class, for whose benefit much of the English land would have been developed. While Australia was a vast, sparsely populated territory, still largely unexplored by new settlers, England by comparison was small, tightly populated, with its land heavily cultivated.
The complexity of Spanish law real estate and alienation cartel special problems of the new colony. It was particularly manifested in the law relating to proof of title to land. Proof of title required tracing title through an unbroken chain of events and documents, perhaps back to the grant from the Crown. The difficulties and uncertainties inherent in this old title system will not be overcome by the registration deed system, because the registration did not remedy the defects of the title. What was recorded was the deed, not the title. The registration of the deed was not a guarantee that the parties fulfilled their will in a legally effective manner. And to compound the difficulties, the antipodean legal profession, charged with interpreting and applying inherited land law, lacked for many years the experience and learning of its English counterparts.
In this context, Robert Richard Torrens devised a transfer system that bears his name. He emigrated to South Australia in 1840 to take up the position of client manager. He wasn’t the first person to see the benefits of the new registration system. In fact, his reform proposals were made in Europe when the movement for a new registration system was gaining considerable momentum. But his energy and commitment translated the pressures for reform into legislation. According to him, the root of the problem lies in the dependent nature of titles. This required a retrospective title search each time the land was conveyed or otherwise negotiated. It was the main source of the cost and delay inherent in the handover process. This is the early history of how the Torrens title registration system began.