The Legal Officers Annual Fees Order 2026 was made on 11 July 2026, laid before Parliament on 31 July 2026 and is due to come into force on 1 January 2027. According to the instrument, it was made by the Fees Advisory Commission under section 86(3) of the Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction and Care of Churches Measure 2018 and approved by the General Synod in line with section 86(11) of that Measure. In practical terms, the Order fixes the 2027 annual fee regime for diocesan and provincial registrars in the Church of England. Its main function is not only to set the yearly sums in Schedule 1, but also to define with greater precision which legal services are treated as part of an annual retainer and which fall outside it.
For diocesan registrars, the annual fee applies to the office-holding duties listed in Schedule 2. For provincial registrars, the annual fee covers the duties of the office other than the work excluded in Part B of Table 2 in Schedule 1, including advice or work connected with clergy discipline proceedings under the Clergy Discipline Measure 2003. The Order also revokes the Legal Officers (Annual Fees) (No. 2) Order 2025. That means the 2027 arrangements will replace the current fee framework rather than sit alongside it.
The payment split is also set out more clearly. The second column of Table 1 is payable by the diocesan board of finance, while the third column of Table 1 and the amounts in Table 2 are payable by the diocesan bishop or the archbishop. The explanatory note attached to the instrument records that section 86(6) of the 2018 Measure requires sums paid by a bishop or archbishop under an order of this kind to be reimbursed by the Church Commissioners. For finance officers, that distinction matters because the formal payer named in the instrument is not always the body that ultimately bears the cost.
Schedule 2 shows that the annual fee for a diocesan registrar is intended to cover the routine legal work that keeps diocesan governance functioning. That includes advice to bishops, archdeacons, diocesan synod officers, clergy, diocesan boards and committees, churchwardens and parochial church council secretaries on legal questions arising from their official roles. It also covers the registrar's standing institutional functions: acting for the diocesan synod and consistory court, keeping diocesan records, making searches and reports from registry material, advising on elections under the Church Representation Rules, and preparing the standard legal instruments used across ordinations, benefice appointments, licences, non-residence arrangements, pastoral schemes and related episcopal acts. The drafting points to a retainer model for day-to-day governance rather than a fee-per-task approach for ordinary diocesan business.
The Order then draws firm limits around that retainer. A diocesan registrar dealing with certain enquiries is not required to correspond with third parties, must first consider whether a matter could more conveniently be handled by the diocesan secretary or another diocesan body, and may decline to advise where two church officers are in dispute. Regular attendance at diocesan board or committee meetings can also be separately paid if the body asks for continuing general advice rather than occasional input on a specific point. A longer list of work is expressly kept outside the annual fee. The excluded matters include conveyancing, trusts, glebe property, litigation, vacancy in see committee work, several forms of clergy discipline and capability cases, safeguarding allegations and risk assessments, work linked to cathedral visitations, Chapter clerk functions, and certain regulatory or misconduct matters. In those cases, the instrument points to separate charging, in many instances by reference to the Solicitors' (Non-Contentious Business) Remuneration Order 2009 or another applicable fees order.
Article 5 reinforces that boundary by stating that a diocesan registrar is not entitled to additional remuneration for the Schedule 2 duties unless article 6 applies. Article 6 then preserves room for a diocesan board of finance to agree an additional annual fee or retainer, but only through a written agreement that expressly says it is made under that article and states how long it will run, or otherwise remains in force until ended on at least three months' notice by either side. The Order also states that prescribed fees are to be increased by reasonable travel, subsistence and accommodation expenses. Where VAT is chargeable on a service covered by the instrument, VAT is payable on top of the relevant fee.
For diocesan boards of finance, bishops' offices, cathedral bodies and legal practitioners, the operational value of the Order lies in its clearer division between routine support and exceptional work. From 1 January 2027, budgeting, engagement letters and internal referral routes will need to reflect the fact that not every matter sent to a registrar is absorbed within the annual fee. For parishes and clergy, the text gives a plainer answer to a recurring question: when is advice part of the registrar's standing role, and when does it move into separately chargeable legal work. Although the monetary figures themselves are set out in Schedule 1, the drafting does most of its practical work by allocating responsibility, narrowing ambiguity and reducing the scope for disagreement about who pays for what.