Hedgerow removal notice or permission for the access

The hedgerow removal notice vs planning permission question has a clean answer that most people get the wrong way round. If you already hold planning permission for development and removing the hedgerow is required to carry it out, you are exempt from the notice procedure under the Hedgerows Regulations 1997. If you do not yet hold permission, the exemption does not apply and taking the hedge out needs a notice, or it is an offence. The order you do things in decides which regime you are in.

Which means the hedge comes out after the permission, never before.

What the hedgerow regulations control

The Hedgerows Regulations 1997 apply in England and Wales to a hedgerow that is 20 m or more in length, or shorter than that where it meets another hedgerow at each end, and which stands on or adjoins agricultural land, common land, a village green, a site of special scientific interest, a local nature reserve, or land used for forestry or for the breeding or keeping of horses.

The exclusion that matters for householders is that the Regulations do not apply to a hedgerow within, or marking the boundary of, the curtilage of a dwellinghouse. A garden hedge is outside the regime entirely, whatever its age or species. A field boundary hedge on the other side of the garden fence is inside it.

That distinction is where most arguments about a new farm or paddock access begin, because the access often cuts a hedge that runs from the garden boundary out along a lane. The regime applies to the agricultural stretch and not to the garden stretch, and the notice has to describe the length to be removed accurately.

The important hedgerow criteria

A notice does not simply get refused. The authority decides whether the hedgerow is "important" within the meaning of the Regulations, and if it is, it serves a hedgerow retention notice.

To be important, a hedgerow must have existed for at least 30 years and satisfy at least one of the criteria in the Schedule. Those criteria fall into two groups.

The archaeology and history group includes a hedgerow that marks the boundary of a parish or township as it existed before 1850, one that incorporates an archaeological feature, one that forms part of a field system predating the Enclosure Acts, and one associated with a scheduled monument or a feature recorded on the historic environment record.

The wildlife and landscape group is scored. It turns on the number of woody species in a sample length, with the threshold varying by region, and on associated features such as a bank, a wall, a ditch, standard trees at intervals, connections to other hedgerows or woodland, and the presence of species protected by wildlife legislation or of plants characteristic of ancient woodland.

The practical consequence: a species-poor hedge of hawthorn planted in the 1970s across a post-war field is very unlikely to be important. A multi-species hedge on a bank, following a line visible on the earliest surviving map of the parish, almost certainly is.

Removal under a planning permission and the exemption

Regulation 6 lists the circumstances in which the notice procedure does not apply, and the one that does the work on development sites is removal required for carrying out development for which planning permission has been granted, or which is permitted development.

Read that literally. Permission must already exist. An outline permission that does not fix the access position will not carry the exemption for a hedge removed to build that access, because the removal is not yet required by anything approved. Nor does a pre-application discussion, a resolution to grant, or a permission subject to a pre-start condition that has not been discharged.

There are other exemptions worth knowing on a rural holding:

• Making a new opening in substitution for an existing one, conditional on the old opening being filled by planting a replacement hedgerow within the period the Regulations specify.
• Proper management of the hedgerow, including coppicing and laying, which is not removal at all.
• Works for national defence, for highway works carried out by the highway authority, and for flood defence or land drainage works carried out by the drainage body.
• Preventing the spread of plant or tree pests and disease.
• Obtaining temporary access to land where emergency works are needed.

Permitted development also carries the exemption, which matters for farm tracks and agricultural buildings under Part 6. But the access itself is the usual sticking point. Forming a new means of access to a highway is permitted development under Part 2 only in connection with other permitted development and not where the access is to a classified road, so a new field entrance onto a B road generally needs its own planning application.

Notice periods and the authority's response

The procedure is short and it is not a planning application.

1. Submit a hedgerow removal notice to the local planning authority on its form, with a plan identifying the hedgerow, its length, the reason for removal and evidence of your interest in the land.
2. The authority has 42 days from receipt to respond.
3. It may serve a hedgerow retention notice, in which case the hedgerow may not be removed, and there is a right of appeal to the Secretary of State.
4. It may notify you that it will not serve a retention notice, in which case you may proceed.
5. If it does nothing within the 42 days, you may remove the hedgerow, and the permission to do so lasts for a limited period rather than indefinitely.

A notice served without a plan, or with a length that does not match what is on the ground, is likely to be treated as invalid, and the 42 days does not start. Include photographs and a dimensioned plan tied to a fixed point.

Where the hedge contains mature trees, check for a Tree Preservation Order and for conservation area status before you touch anything, because those regimes operate independently of the hedgerow rules. A tree survey to the relevant British Standard will identify the trees, their root protection areas and which of them constrain the access geometry, and councils expect a suitably qualified author for arboricultural work with professional review strongly advised.

Penalties for removal without notice

Removing an important hedgerow without authority is an offence, triable in the magistrates' court, and the cap on the fine was removed for offences in England and Wales, so the fine is unlimited. The authority may also serve a notice requiring a replacement hedgerow to be planted, and the obligation to maintain the replacement runs with the land.

The reputational consequence on a development site is worse than the fine. An applicant who has removed a hedge without notice starts every subsequent conversation with that authority from a weaker position, and the removal will be referred to in the officer report on the application it was meant to serve.

Enforcement in this field is often triggered by a neighbour or a parish council with photographs, and aerial imagery makes the before-and-after easy to establish. Do not assume nobody is watching a quiet lane.

Biodiversity consequences in the metric

Hedgerows sit in their own module of the statutory biodiversity metric, separate from area habitats, and the trading rules require hedgerow losses to be compensated with hedgerow units rather than with grassland or scrub. A scheme that removes 60 m of species-rich hedge for an access cannot buy its way out with a wildflower meadow somewhere else on site.

Two consequences for the budget and the layout. First, the de minimis exemption from mandatory biodiversity net gain is set at a short length of linear habitat, so a visibility splay that takes out more than that brings the whole regime into play. Second, replacement planting has to be in the right place, of the right composition, and managed for thirty years, which means a management plan and a mechanism to secure it.

The Biodiversity Net Gain Assessment rests on that metric, and the Environment Act 2021 regime expects it to be completed by a competent person with the biodiversity gain plan approved by the local planning authority. A drafted assessment is a starting point for that person, not a substitute. Baseline condition for a hedgerow is assessed against published criteria that reward continuity, structure and the absence of gaps, which is why a thorough survey at the outset usually improves the baseline rather than worsening it.

Nesting birds are a separate and absolute constraint. The breeding season runs roughly from March to August, and removing a hedge in active use by nesting birds is an offence under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 regardless of hedgerow or planning consents. A Preliminary Ecological Appraisal will identify the issue and set the timing.

Sequencing notice and application

The order that works on a new access, assuming the hedge is subject to the Regulations:

Survey the hedgerow and the trees in it first, so the access geometry can be drawn around what has to be kept. Establish whether the hedge is likely to be important, because that changes the design rather than the paperwork. Then apply for planning permission for the access, with the visibility splays dimensioned and the hedgerow removal shown on the drawings and justified in the Transport Statement or access statement. Once permission is granted, the removal falls within the Regulation 6 exemption and no notice is needed.

The order that goes wrong: remove the hedge to see whether the splay works, then apply. That is an offence if the hedge was important, it removes the baseline the biodiversity metric needs, and it hands the highway authority a fait accompli it may not accept.

One honest uncertainty. Whether a particular hedge meets the 30 year and criteria tests is a judgement, and authorities differ in how strictly they apply the species counts. Where the answer is close, serving a notice and letting the authority decide costs less than guessing wrong.

This is general guidance, not legal advice; check the position with your local planning authority or a qualified professional before relying on it. To see which documents a new access is likely to need, enter the postcode on PlanScope.

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