High hedges complaints and the loss of light procedure

A high hedge complaint to the council is a statutory remedy, and it has nothing to do with planning permission. Part 8 of the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 lets you ask your local authority to decide whether a neighbouring hedge is unreasonably affecting the enjoyment of your property, and to order it cut back. The council charges a fee, the test is narrow, and you have to show you tried to sort it out yourself first.

The narrowness catches people out. A single overgrown oak is outside the scheme entirely. So is a deciduous beech hedge in most cases, and so is a hedge that blocks a view rather than light.

What Part 8 of the 2003 Act covers

Sections 65 to 84 of the Act give district, unitary, London borough and equivalent councils the power to determine complaints about high hedges. The complaint must come from an owner or occupier of domestic property whose reasonable enjoyment of that property is being adversely affected by the height of a hedge situated on land owned or occupied by someone else.

The authority is deciding one question: whether the hedge is adversely affecting the complainant's reasonable enjoyment of the property, and if so what action is needed to remedy it. The answer is a remedial notice or a refusal, and either can be appealed.

It is a complaints scheme, not a dispute resolution service. The council does not mediate, and it will not act for you against a hedge on your own land.

The two metre and evergreen tests

The definition in section 66 is precise. A high hedge is a barrier to light or access, formed wholly or predominantly by a line of two or more evergreen or semi-evergreen trees or shrubs, and rising to a height of more than two metres above ground level.

Each element matters:

• A line of two or more. A single tree, however large, is not a hedge under the Act.
• Evergreen or semi-evergreen. Leyland cypress is the classic subject. A deciduous hornbeam or beech hedge usually falls outside, though a beech that holds its brown leaves through winter has been argued both ways.
• More than two metres above ground level, measured from the ground where the hedge is growing rather than from the complainant's side where levels differ.
• A barrier to light or access. Gaps matter. A hedge with substantial gaps at the relevant height may not be a barrier at all.

A council cannot require a hedge to be reduced below two metres, and it cannot require removal. The remedy is reduction and ongoing maintenance.

Steps you have to take before complaining

The Act requires the complainant to have taken all reasonable steps to resolve the matter without involving the council. Authorities take this seriously and will reject a complaint that arrives without evidence of it.

What counts as reasonable steps in practice:

1. A polite conversation, followed by a letter or email setting out the problem and what you are asking for.
2. A second letter if there is no reply, sent so that you have proof of delivery.
3. An offer of mediation, or a referral to a local community mediation service.
4. A dated record of each attempt, with photographs of the hedge from inside the affected rooms and from the garden.

Keep the photographs consistent. Shots from the same window at the same time of day across a few months are far more useful than a single dramatic image, and the officer assessing the case will use them.

The fee and what it buys

Councils set their own fee for a high hedges complaint and publish it on their website. The figure varies a good deal between authorities, some offer a reduction or waiver for complainants on qualifying benefits, and the fee is generally payable whether or not the complaint succeeds. Check the current figure on your council's own page before you commit, because it changes.

The fee covers the council's assessment: a site visit, measurement, an evaluation against national guidance, and a formal decision. Some authorities refund part of it if the hedge owner cuts the hedge before the assessment is completed. That is a local policy, not a statutory right.

How the council measures loss of light

Officers apply the government guidance on hedge height and light loss, which sets out a method for calculating an action hedge height. The method takes the distance between the hedge and the affected windows, the orientation, the height of the windows above ground and the size of the garden, and produces the height to which the hedge could reasonably be reduced.

Two features of the method surprise complainants. First, it is generous to the hedge owner where the affected window is a long way back from the boundary. Second, the result is a height rather than a judgment about whether the hedge is unattractive, since appearance is not a ground of complaint.

This is a different exercise from a planning daylight study. A Daylight and Sunlight Assessment prepared for a planning application follows BRE 209 and measures things like vertical sky component and annual probable sunlight hours against a proposed building. Our explanation of what vertical sky component actually measures sets out that planning test. Neither method is used for the other purpose, and quoting BRE figures in a hedge complaint tends to confuse rather than help.

Remedial notices, appeals and offences

If the complaint succeeds, the council issues a remedial notice on the hedge owner. It specifies the initial action, the date by which it must be done, and any preventative action needed afterwards to keep the hedge at the required height. There is a compliance period, and the notice is registered as a local land charge, so it binds later owners of the land.

Either party can appeal to the Secretary of State within 28 days, and the appeal is handled by the Planning Inspectorate. Appeals are usually decided on written representations with a site visit.

Failure to comply with a remedial notice without reasonable excuse is a criminal offence, prosecuted in the magistrates court and punishable by a fine. The council also has a power to enter the land, carry out the work and recover its costs from the hedge owner.

Why planning enforcement is the wrong door

Growing a hedge is not development, so there is nothing for the planning enforcement team to enforce against. Three exceptions are worth knowing about.

If a landscaping condition on a planning permission required a hedge to be maintained at a stated height, breach of that condition is a planning matter and a breach of condition notice is available. If the trees forming the hedge are protected by a Tree Preservation Order or stand in a conservation area, consent or a six week section 211 notice is needed before the hedge owner can cut them, which can delay compliance with a remedial notice. And if the hedge is on highway land, the highway authority deals with it under the Highways Act 1980 rather than the council's hedge team.

Where a hedge sits alongside a development site, the position changes again. Trees to be retained should be surveyed under BS 5837:2012 and shown with root protection areas on the layout, which is the work covered by a Tree Survey. Neighbours objecting to a scheme on light grounds are making a planning objection, and our note on responding to a neighbour's daylight objection covers that ground.

An illustrative case: a row of eight leylandii at 6 m along a south-facing boundary, 4 m from the rear elevation of a bungalow. That is squarely within the scheme. The same trees 25 m away across a large garden may well produce an action hedge height above their current height, meaning no remedial notice.

Before you pay the fee, read your council's high hedges page, download its complaint form and its published fee, and check that the hedge meets every part of the section 66 definition.

If the hedge borders a site you are planning to develop, enter your postcode on PlanScope to see which tree and amenity reports the site is likely to need.

This is general guidance, not legal advice. Check the position with your local planning authority or a qualified professional before relying on it.

PlanScope provides AI-assisted draft reports for planning applications. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval.