Subject to the provisions of this section, where land has been acquired or appropriated as mentioned in section 271(1), and—
the undertakers may serve on the acquiring or appropriating authority a notice claiming the right to enter on the land and carry out such works for the removal or re-siting of the apparatus or any part of it as may be specified in the notice.
No notice under this section shall be served later than 21 days after the beginning of the development of land which has been acquired or appropriated as mentioned in section 271(1).
Where a notice is served under this section, the authority on whom it is served may, before the end of the period of 28 days from the date of service, serve on the statutory undertakers a counter-notice—
If no counter-notice is served under subsection (3), the statutory undertakers shall, after the end of that period, have the rights claimed in their notice.
If a counter-notice is served under subsection (3), the statutory undertakers who served the notice under this section may either withdraw it or may apply to the Secretary of State and the appropriate Minister for an order under this section conferring on the undertakers the rights claimed in the notice or such modified rights as the Secretary of State and the appropriate Minister think it expedient to confer on them.
Where, by virtue of this section or of an order of Ministers under it, statutory undertakers have the right to execute works for the removal or re-siting of apparatus, they may arrange with the acquiring or appropriating authority for the works to be carried out by that authority, under the superintendence of the undertakers, instead of by the undertakers themselves.
In subsection (1)(a), the reference to apparatus vested in or belonging to statutory undertakers shall include a reference to electronic communications apparatus kept installed for the purposes of an electronic communications code network .
For the purposes of subsection (7), in this section—