In the 1850’s Robert Richard Torrens a South Australian statesman devised a system to simplify the cumbersome Land Title registration procedure, which was based on the old British system. This “Old System” consisted of a chain of documents/deeds detailing the lands past and present ownership and mortgage history. This bundle of documents could be quite bulky and was usually tied together with pink cotton ribbon. It is thought this is where we get the term “Red Tape”.
