daltontrees

I'm not sure what we're talking about any more. One has a duty at law to warn a tree owner of the risk. But one does not have a duty to report them to the authorities straight away for not giving one the work to deal with the tree. What are you meaning by pointing them in the right direction? I too am annoyed at irresponsible owners. In teh past few years I have personally, acting as a member of the public, brought some killer trees to the attention of landowners. 30 metre high limes and beech with kretz or meripilus, might even have saved a life by doing so. 2 outside a school, 3 outside a nursery. In all cases they did something about the trees, eventually.

I'll think the tree owner is a bad person, especially as he was warned by a tree professional.

He didn't quite say imminent danger, he said pretty sure its going to fall over as some point. But yes the target is a public area. Maybe customer just didn't like the price. Contractor has done the right thing and warned the customer. But it's the same principle, you let someone onto your land and they report you to the authorities. Definitely wouldn't get the hedge work. Definitely would get the contractor the reputation of being someone you couldn't trust. I am a bit cynical, I formally assess the risk from about 200 trees a week, and it is quite rare to find any that need to be dealt with with any urgency. The usual perception of risk is poor condition whereas the real risk is often the severity and the likelihood of someone or something being present at the time of failure. Without that information a 'sooner rather than later' prognosis doesn't quite merit breach of client confidentiality. Besides, it's always going to look like it was reported because the contractor didn't get the work. And that's a bad look.

It's hardly a machine gun rampage. Reporting a customer for not accepting your advice would be petty and pathetic and in the circumstances unnecessary. A sure recipe for getting a reputation as a contractor for being a weirdo and untrustable. So... get given the hedge work then report him for some vague future risk to a neighbour. How does thats look in anyones eyes? You might (you would) lose this customer, but if I was friends with the customer and heard about this I woudn't let you anywhere near my property to price work. Because you would be a snooper. Lose the odd job yes. Lose your good reputation, never.

The only risk is to the neighbour, not the public. And we don't know if the customer is going to deal with it in some other way. So it's a big assumption to make that the public will be endangered IF only the ash tree is removed, AND its removal destabilises the neighbour's tree. IF! AND! Here's another if. If I allowed a contractor onto my land to price a jonb and he went off to tell on me for something that might maybe perhaps at some time in the future affect my neighbour if I gave him paid work to remove my tree, I'd be livid. I think almost everyone on Arbtalk would be too. You seem to have escalated this in your mind from trivial, private and unlikely to serious, imminent public risk.

There is no obligation to report it to Highways. I'd go further and say that there is no right to. Reporting a customer to the authorities? Are you serious? That would be a fundamental breach of confidentiality. And seriously bad business. Warn the customer of the risk. Then forget about it.

I believe the distinction is universal, but I see a lot of contractors calling cutomers clients, maybe they think it makes them look fancier, the way that 'tree surgeon' makes a tree butcher look fancier. But I expect in a court of law anyone calling their customer a client would be implying an advisory role requiring professional indemnity. When I was a surveyor (MRICS) I remember our law lecturer stating that even if you weren't being paid for the advice you were still professionally liable for it.

It would be interesting to see what would happen if you injected the stem with tabasco? Or spray the leaves with it, and let it be absorbed into the phloem (bark) like glyphosate is. On the other hand the wee buggers might get to like the hot taste and come along every friday nght after the pubs shut and give it a good chew.

Is this a customer or a client? A client is someone that pays you for advice. A customer is someone that pays you to do work. Call them a client and they will expect to be able to rely on your advice. Even if it's verbal. Even if they didn't have to pay for it, directly or indirectly. On a general point of law, your 'customer' has no obligation to provide support for a tree on adjacent land. If in doubt leave a decent stump, and as it decays the elm should either adapt to loss of support or start leaning over. Not your customer's fault. If you can't leave a stump, warn the neighbour of possible sudden loss of support. It's then for them to guard against failure, harm or damage.

Tough one today. Got it on the last chance.

"Fray Bentos and cheap read wine is all they eat in the Argentine. But after a scrap with the english navy, they'll ask for the recipe for chips and gravy." Too much humour for this to be punk. Puts me in mind of the Sleaford Mods for sheer poetry.

Love it! A hoot.

It sholdn't be a fight, the Council is only trying to control the spread of DED. As far as I know there are only 2 places this happens, Brighton (which is partly isolated by geography from othe DED areas) and Edinburgh which is a World Heritage Centre and has a lot of good elms still that are important for the amenity of the city. The Council might get it wrong sometimes. A section of yellowing leaves could be early DED or it could be a bit of storm damage or other causes. Maybe that's what happened here. If you ask the Council they will come out and re-appraise, as they keep records of all suspected DED cases. Let them see it close-up. They can't make you remove it, but it's some testament to their sense of purpose that they might be willing to pay to remove it.

That's not a helpful attitude. After they get infected they stand as 'breeders' for several years afterwards and leaving a breeder in place launches a huge number of beetles that then infect other trees. It's not about risk of harm, it's about minimising spread of DED. Instead of telling the Council to bugger off, do you not stop and wonder why they're patrolling the city trying to catch early infections so that they can keep as many of the elm population as possible.

Not so daft, but I don't know. The statutory responsibility of a Council to ensure the adequacy of foundations may or may not (depending on what the Building Regs say) include adequacy against subsidence or heave. I just don't know. I'm in Scotland where shrinkable clays are almost non-existent and we have our own Building Standards here so I know zip about English system.

The difficulty with reading into the case is that we don't know if it was low value. The court on a point of law overruled a tribunal's interpretation of the law, and sent the case back for re-valuation. By rights it should have gone from the Council being completely liable to the builder being mostly liable. I don't think the amounts were ever published. The law is getting a bit clearer and I think we should be grateful that Gloucester took it to appeal as a matter of public interest. You're right about a culture of settling. I'm sure there's a sub-culture of completely spurious claims that take advantage of it. The conservatory case I suppose was one where because a conservatory doesn't need bulding warrant there is no objective standard for foundation design and the builder probably just made something up. But for a house extension where a warrant is needed, supported by a structural engineer's calculations and certification of design, an inadequate foundation would have been stopped before getting on site. Or an inadequate foundation woud hav ebeen contributory negligence.

Sorry I meant trespass as a form of nuisance. It's still wrong. So much so that I think it is considered a 'strict liability offence' i.e. there is no need to prove nuisance, simply being there is wrong. But I'm in Scotland where attitudes to trespass are different and the law has been changed radicaly to allow or codify rights to roam.

Good question, i.e. a bastard to answer. As I understand it encroachment is relatively trivial if it can be abated easily. But it becomes nuisance when it prevents the reasonable use of the garden. In that respect it doesn't even have to be causing damage (myth no. 1). Encroachment becomes negligence when it foreseeable causes damage or other loss. English case law is littered with confusing written judgements that conflate nuisance and negligence (myth no.2) but as time goes by the important distinction is made between nuisance (prevention of use) and negigence (damage or loss). Trespass as a legal principle no longer exists but it was treated in old authorities as nuisance, and was referred to recenly in a big case as nuisance, but that's only relevant in wilful acts of encroachment. Tree roots encroach gradaually and unseen; the intent (or even neglect) and foreseeability are far from obvious. Trespass, nuisance and negligence are all (in England) torts, wrongs of act or omission. In some ways it doesn't matter what brand of tort it is, it's still a wrong against another. But nuisance is a breach of property rights (the rights to enjoy your property) and negligence by tree root damage is a differnet kind of wrong against a person's property, causing loss.

You'd think so, but no. There is specific case law (known as the candy floss conservatory case) where the foundations were totally substandard but the adjacent tree owner was still liable (to some degree) for subsidence. It might be different if the foundations were meant to have been designed to a particular standard e.g. the current NHBC guidelines, but weren't. The tree owner then might argue contributory negligence, which I think personally is valid and fair. The house owner would then have to sue the designers. I expect in the next few years a case like that will come through, as the candy floss case really dodged the scale of the issue (because it then referred the compensation issue back to a tribunal).

It doesn't matter what came first. At law, encroachment is negligence if it causes foreseeable damage.

I can't be bothered replying to first time posters becuase they usually do vanish if no-one has given them an authoritative, detailed, free, copper-bottomed solution to their vague problem within say 10 minutes. Arbtalk should have an AI engine for such requests, it could generate eloquent generic advice without saying anything useful or commital. We could call it Arbificial Intelligence.

Well one could possibly contrive a situation where it's justifiable, but not in the normal business of life. I cant even think of one.

It won't rot and die because of the inclusion. The inclusion may split open in the future, leaving a fraction of the tree and a gaping wound that will never heal over.

Aoother arbtalk thread where no-one answers the question put by the OP. No, you can't cut down the tree on adjacent land. Not lawfully in any circumstances unless with the owner's permission. You could cut back roots and branches to the boundary. You may be able to mitigate or eliminate the adverse effects of the tree on your soils in various ways that do not involve removing the tree.

First chance I get to try this again for myself I will take it, but I don't do so much tree work these days. I'll try it with a silky on something small, the principle is the same at any size.