urgent help with hedges in a conservation area

[Minotaur]

IMO its highly unlikely you will get procesuted for removing a Laurel hedge, however, you have possibly contravened the law. So contact the local council, planning or tree officer/whoevers dealing with it, eat a bit of humble pie, appologise and see what they say.

 

Points to note: You only need to notify the LPA, you do NOT need permission , for tree works within the CA. Trees being defined by those of 75mm diameter at 1.5metres baove the ground.

The definition of tree is the spurious point.

 

My opinion would be that Laurel is not a tree, however, there are so many laws and technical points that somewhere, someone, sometime might have proven something to the contrary in case law.

CA act however, is the protection of the environmental as a whole, trees, buildings, walls, street ware, etc, etc. So any structure or item of significant environmental value - whether your hedge layed within that is questonable.

[Amelanchier]

Like I said, the mechanism of CA protection (as it relates to trees) is to allow the LPA to protect valuable, significant or important trees using TPOs. Therefore if it cannot be TPO'd, there is no point notifying. (Do you notify if grinding a stump?) Where you are unsure if the LPA would call a certain assemblage of woody plants a tree, it might be an idea to ask them if they considered it so with a view to making life easier on yourself, however the law is deliberatly vague on that point. IMO if it looks like a hedge, is composed of a common hedging species, is located on a boundary, has been maintained as a hedge, lacks susbtantial height, and does not include identifiably individual trees then it is probably a hedge. Therefore note section 2.3 of the Blue Book (a.k.a. Tree Preservation Orders: A Guide to the Law and Good Practice)

 

"2.3 A TPO may only be used to protect trees and cannot be applied to bushes or shrubs, although in the Secretary of State's view a TPO may be made to protect trees in hedges or an old hedge which has become a line of trees of a reasonable height and is not subject to hedgerow management."

 

Note that the above does not define any of those terms - thats the job of the old bloke in the wig should you decide to ask him.

 

Just to add, that the LPA is not the agent of enforcement of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 or any of the Habitat Regs; the Police and the CPS are.

[Gary Prentice]

The legal definition of a tree was decided in court as that "what is generally accepted as being a tree." No one in this industry would call a laurel a tree and this councils legal department would have extreme difficulty proving this in court.

 

Generally I submit 211 notices for reduction of cypress hedges and any others composing of "tree species"

 

Even if you went to court the defence would be that you notified the council. Because the guidelines are only guidelines, firstly not every LPA even bother to send a receipt of application/notification. (Ours don't and because they are not legally obliged to, you don't know that they actually did). After a six week period, if the council don't protect the tree/hedge the applicant/agent may proceed.

 

The difference in a CA as opposed to an actual TPO is that no answer is grounds for appeal for a TPO and is classed as a refusal for that purpose.

 

The LPA's legal team would have to prove that you did not notify them via a 211 notice. Hopefully you didn't get to talk to an enforcement officer at any stage or get cautioned.

 

Anyway, this shouldn't proceed any further.

 

As an aside, we viewed an ash in a CA, informed the client of its status. Later the client got someone to attempt to fell it. Things went seriously wrong and we were called back to find the top of the tree with a bite and felling cut in it being held up by two recovery vehicles. The canopy was leaning over the neighbours house.

 

We got a crane into the canopy to support it long enough to dismantle it. The LPA attended, know that the client knew about the status (we'd informed him and would say so in court) and six months later are still undecided wether to proceed to court. Go figure!!!

[Dave Rouse]

If the individual stems were greater than 75 mm diameter measured at 1.5 metres above ground level then they would be covered by conservation area rules.

 

according to herefordshire councils website peter is spot on!

[arbmark]

sort of on the point - i heard you could coppice hedges of overgrown trees, which meant you could then remove them a couple of years later once they had grown back into hedges. whaddya all think about that one! havent tried it!!! and probably wont either...

[Pedroski]

The legal definition of a tree was decided in court as that "what is generally accepted as being a tree." No one in this industry would call a laurel a tree and this councils legal department would have extreme difficulty proving this in court.

 

So, if a laurel is 18 metres tall, it's still a shrub then?

[RobRainford]

So, if a laurel is 18 metres tall, it's still a shrub then?

 

As said before, if the dbh is greater than 75mm at 1.5m then it is covered by the CA rules. Regardless of species.

[skyhuck]

As said before, if the dbh is greater than 75mm at 1.5m then it is covered by the CA rules. Regardless of species.

 

Not if its a "shrub".

[Gary Prentice]

So, if a laurel is 18 metres tall, it's still a shrub then?

 

Statue is irrelevant. A bonsai pine at 6 inches high and 60 years old isn't a shrub and a laurel isn't a tree irrespective of height. There is or was a wisteria at kew with a dbh over 75mm, tree, shrub or climbing plant?

 

There are many grey areas within the T & C Acts, hence so many court cases for our learned friends to debate on what the original intentions of the wordings were.

[Gary Prentice]

As said before, if the dbh is greater than 75mm at 1.5m then it is covered by the CA rules. Regardless of species.

 

The actual wording with regard to the 75mm dbh (or 100mm if the purpose is management such as to allow better trees to develop) states "trees".