Applying for consent to work on a protected tree

Work to a tree covered by a Tree Preservation Order needs the council's written consent first, and the application is free. That is the part most householders do not know. There is no fee for a TPO application, the form is short, and the council has eight weeks to decide. What costs money is doing the work without consent, because the offence of destroying a protected tree carries an unlimited fine and the court is directed to take account of any financial benefit the offender gained.

Before you apply, check whether you need to at all. Several exemptions exist, and one of them may cover your situation.

What a Tree Preservation Order stops

An Order made under section 198 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 prohibits cutting down, topping, lopping, uprooting, wilfully damaging or wilfully destroying the protected tree without the authority's consent. It can cover an individual tree, a group, an area or a woodland.

The prohibition covers pruning as well as felling. Crown reduction, crown lifting, thinning and removing a limb are all works requiring consent. Cutting roots is covered too, which catches trench digging for a foundation, a soakaway or a service run near the tree.

Ownership is irrelevant. If a protected tree stands in your neighbour's garden and overhangs yours, the common law right to cut back overhanging branches to the boundary is limited by the Order, and you need consent before you cut.

Check the position on the council's website, since authorities publish TPO maps and many are also on the national planning data service. Ask the tree officer directly if the mapping is unclear. Getting that answer in writing takes a day and settles the question.

The exemptions, and the notice each one needs

The Town and Country Planning (Tree Preservation) (England) Regulations 2012 set out when works can go ahead without consent. The exemptions are narrower than people assume, and most of them carry a notice requirement.

• A dead tree may be removed, but you must give the authority five days' notice before the work unless the situation is urgent, in which case notice is given as soon as practicable afterwards.
• Works to remove an immediate risk of serious harm follow the same notice pattern. The test is a present danger, not a general concern about the species.
• Works to prevent or abate a nuisance, meaning a nuisance that could be sued on at common law rather than an inconvenience.
• Works required by an Act of Parliament, or by a statutory undertaker in specified circumstances.
• Fruit trees cultivated for fruit production in the course of a business, and work to fruit trees in accordance with good horticultural practice.
• Felling authorised by a Forestry Commission licence or a grant scheme.

Two things trip people up. Dying is no longer a general exemption in the way it once was, so a declining tree usually needs an application. And where a tree is removed under the dead or dangerous exemptions, a duty to plant a replacement tree of appropriate size and species, in the same place, usually follows.

If you rely on an exemption, photograph the tree before the work, keep the arboriculturist's written opinion, and send the notice. The evidence is what protects you if the council asks later.

Making the application

Use the standard application form for works to protected trees. It goes to the local planning authority and there is no fee.

A good application gives the officer everything they need to say yes.

1. A plan showing the tree, numbered, with the property boundary and the position of any structure involved.
2. A schedule describing the works tree by tree, in the language of BS 3998, so crown reduction with a stated reduction in branch length rather than "cut back hard".
3. The reason for each item of work, stated specifically. Excessive shade on a particular window, deadwood over a footpath, a fungal fruiting body at the base.
4. Photographs, taken from a position that shows the problem.
5. Supporting evidence where the reason is technical.

That last point decides most refusals. A claim that the tree is causing subsidence needs proper evidence: crack monitoring over a period, level monitoring, soil analysis showing shrinkable clay, and root identification from beneath the foundation. A claim that a tree is dangerous needs an inspection report from a competent arboriculturist naming the defect. Where a scheme of development is involved, the tree officer will want to see the arboricultural work supporting it, and a tree survey to BS 5837 with root protection areas is the document that carries the argument.

Do not ask for more than you need. An application to remove a healthy mature oak because it drops leaves will be refused, and it makes the officer sceptical about the rest of the schedule.

Trees in a conservation area

Trees in a conservation area that are not already covered by an Order have their own regime under section 211. You give the council six weeks' written notice of the proposed works, describing them, for any tree above the stem diameter threshold set in the regulations, measured at 1.5 m above ground.

During those six weeks the council can make a Tree Preservation Order, which converts your notice into a situation requiring a full application. If it does nothing, you may carry out the works described, and the permission to do so lasts for two years.

The notice is not an application and there is no decision to appeal. Practically, a short conversation with the tree officer before serving it often produces a better outcome than a formal notice that prompts a protective Order.

Deciding, appealing and compensation

The authority has eight weeks. It can grant consent, grant it with conditions, or refuse. Conditions commonly require the work to be done to a stated standard, within a stated period, and by a competent contractor, and often require replacement planting.

If consent is refused, or granted with conditions you object to, you can appeal to the Secretary of State, and the deadline is short, so read the decision notice on the day it arrives. If the council does not decide within eight weeks you can appeal on the ground that it has failed to determine the application.

Compensation is possible but limited. The 2012 Regulations allow a claim for loss or damage caused by a refusal or by conditions, subject to a minimum claim value and a time limit, and the loss of development value is excluded. Claims are uncommon and evidence-heavy.

Illustrative example: a householder wants a 30 per cent crown reduction on a protected lime shading a rear garden. The application as first drafted asked for removal. The tree officer refused. A second application, prepared with an arboriculturist and describing a reduction in branch length with a target crown shape, was granted with a condition requiring the work to be carried out to BS 3998 within two years.

What happens if you get it wrong

Destroying a protected tree, or carrying out work likely to destroy it, is the serious offence and carries an unlimited fine. Other contraventions carry a lower fine set by reference to the standard scale. Section 206 then imposes a duty to plant a replacement tree, and that duty can be enforced by notice.

Contractors are not a shield. Both the person who carries out the work and the person who caused it to be carried out can be prosecuted, which is why any quotation for tree work should state that the contractor has checked the protection status.

This is general guidance rather than legal advice. Check the position with your local planning authority or a qualified professional before relying on it.

If your project involves protected trees, a landscape strategy showing replacement planting strengthens the case, and you can enter your postcode on PlanScope to see which documents your application is likely to need. PlanScope provides AI-assisted draft reports for planning applications. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval.