Leylandii dispute - who pays the council?

[craigiep]

If a person requests the involvement of the council in trying to have leylandii trees on a neighbouring property lopped in size, and the council charges �300 for that involvement, who pays the �300? If your answer is 'the person requesting the involvement of the council', if the council decides in that person's favour can that person then make the neighbour with the offending trees pay the �300?

[jake-the-peg]

Check with your council - different councils have different rules.

In general the complainer will have to pay to have the council look at it but some councils refund part or all of that fee if they find in favour of the complaint.

The rules are:
A) it must be a hedge - no sigle trees - branches must overlap
B) It must be over 2m high
C) It must detract from somebody's "reasonable enjoyment of their property"

Obviously that last one is the biggie and most open to interpretation. If you've a 2 acre garden and your neighbour has a high hedge 50 yards from your house you're not likely to suceed compared to if you have a small garden which is totally overshadowed

[JudgeJ]

You could try to recover the sum via the small claims procedure of the County Court � though it is by no means certain that you would succeed.

The much heralded �high hedge� scheme is a typical example of the way government and local councils spin a good yarn. Everybody thought they would simply contact their local council about their neighbour�s 50 foot hedge and the next morning it would be cut down. The realitry, however, is somewhat different.

The measures were included in the Anti-Social Behaviour Act of 2003. However, this was simply a vehicle of convenience to enable the legislation to be enacted. It is accepted that there is no anti-social behaviour or offence committed (unless the hedge owner refuses to comply with the Council�s decision) and no penalty can be imposed simply for owning a high hedge.

As a result, authorities are not investigating any offence - none has been committed, even if a complainant 'wins' their case - and so the legislation does not deal in innocent or guilty parties. As a result, the fee is a payment for a service - not a penalty.

The Act clearly states that complainants must pay a fee to the Council when they submit their hedge complaint. Councils are free to set this fee at any level they think fit and most, as you say, charge around �300.

There is no procedure under the Act for the complainant to obtain re-payment of the fee, either from the Council or from the hedge owner. Unless reimbursement is forthcoming from the Council as jake suggests, the small claims court is the only remedy. The chances of success will depend very much upon what other efforts (prior to the involvement of the Council) were made to settle the dispute and what efforts since then have been made to recover the fee.

[jake-the-peg]

You just can't bring yourself to acknowledge that this Government has brought in legislation that allows people to get redress whereas they could have done nothing under the Tory's can you JudgeJ?

Most councils generally impose charges to deter frivolous claims.

There's a list of councils and their policies here:

http://freespace.virgin.net/clare.h/JHdgFees.h tm

The highest fee is Sevenoaks �650; and there are 8 that are free

[JudgeJ]

I just don't like the idea of legislation which costs the innocent party money to have enforced in their favour, jake.

It is either acceptable or it is not to grow high hedges. If Parliament deems that it is not then detection and enforcement should be provided free of charge.

It is not appropriate in other areas of law enforcement to make a charge to establish if the law has been broken. Nobody suggests that the police should make a charge to visit properties that have been burgled (if one can get a visit at all, that is) to deter "frivolous" reports.

It has nothing to do with party politics. It's simply bad legislation, whoever introduced it.