Neighbour ignoring council instruction to move fence

FlatFour

Hi,

I'm hoping to get some advice.  Basically, we had new neighbours move in last year - their property bordering the end of our, and our immediate neighbours, back garden.  The boundary, for the last 40 years plus, has been a row of fir trees that have gotten rather large over the years.  Our new neighbours decided they wanted to take these trees down, which was good news as these trees cast a lot of shade.  We allowed the tree surgeon - someone we knew incidentally, he used to live locally - full access to our garden, to make his life easier.  Everything going nicely thus far.  We were a little surprised when, after the trees were felled, the stumps were not removed but assumed that'd be a later job.

A couple of weeks later, the new neighbours got someone in to place a 6 ft panel fence as the new boundary.  However, as they'd not removed the stumps he came over two to three feet in places into our (and our immediate neighbours) side as he zig-zagged the fence around the stumps.  During the work he was told repeatedly that he'd come over too far, but was too arrogant to acknowledge this.  Along much of the boundary, we have some wooden buildings (basically garden sheds) that were built a couple of feet back from the original boundary trees to give access to the rear for treatment - being wood, they need topping up every so often (usually yearly) with a wood treatment.  With the fence how it was placed, it was impossible to gain access, the neighbours fence had come over so far.  The chap doing the fencing didn't seem to give a damn saying "you'll just have to squeeze in" - which was just a ridiculous thing to say - when he should have just straightened it out as asked.

After speaking to the neighbour directly, he seem quite dismissive of the issue of this fence encroaching into our garden area and basically ignored us.  A very diplomatically worded letter was written, but this also seemed to be ignored.  A few weeks later the wife came around, very apologetic saying she wasn't aware of the issue and had only just seen the letter.  We just asked that they correct the issue and everything will be fine, no harm done.  This appeared to be the start of getting things sorted, however, nothing happened.

We were eventually forced to report this to the local council, who sent someone out to inspect the new panel fence.  While they said the boundary wasn't very well defined in the official plans - they basically just said it was a straight line from a certain point - the fact that what had been the boundary for over 40 years was still there - the stumps, all in a straight line - and the fact that the fence zig-zagged by several feet back and forth along our, and our immediate neighbours, boundary, meant they were told to correct the issue.  Basically, build the fence straight not zig zagging to go around the tree stumps going into our garden to do so.  That seemed the end of it, with the new neighbour officially being told to fix it - we have a copy of the letter with these instructions.

Fast forward to last week, after a few months of zero action on our neighbours part, and they appeared to have workmen in removing some of the tree stumps.  Our initial thought was that they were finally getting on and fixing things.  To our surprise however they've not removed the stumps to correct the placement of the fence, rather they planted a load of laurel saplings (about 7-8 feet tall) right up against the fence.  This implies that they have no intention of straightening out the fence where it comes over our side of the boundary.

Long description I know, but I wanted to include all the details.  In essence though, the new neighbours have been instructed to move their fence where it comes into our (and our immediate neighbours) garden, yet they've totally ignored this instruction and have gone even further by planting these laurel saplings right up against the fence.  This will make it even harder to move.

Councils do seem to very wishy-washy at times with their responses to things, but we've done everything right and have been vindicated re: our complaint, yet the new neighbour is blatantly ignoring what he's been instructed by the council to do.  He's built a fence that strays into our garden, and seemingly has no intent on obeying the instructions given from the council's Legal Department people.

What should our next step be?  This is causing a degree of grief as we cannot access the rear of our buildings and we're wanting to treat the wood and do the usual maintenance that's required with such wooden structures.  It's also the arrogance that gets to me, this person thinks they can do whatever they want.

I know this might seem a trivial thing to be dealing with considering the current situation, but it appears as if the neighbour has no intent on following the instructions given, and continues to do whatever he wants.  This is wrong.  I had hoped things would be resolved once the instruction was given for the neighbour to do so.  We've been patient with the time scale due to the time of year, but the new neighbour doesn't seem to care at all and has just carried on.

We will contact the council again and report what's happening, but they're already aware that the neighbour had done nothing so far.  The whole thing seems really silly - it's just moving a few posts, and if they've gone to the effort to remove some of the stumps, why not fix the issue at the same time?  I don't know how much further I can escalate this if the council don't take action now that their instructions have been quite blatantly ignored.  I've never been in this situation before.

Hope someone can advise.

Cheers.

davidmcn

Can you explain why the planning department are involved in what seems to be a neighbour boundary dispute? That wasn't clear from your story.

FlatFour

Hi, sorry, I miss-spoke, I meant Legal Department at the council, not planning - I will attempt to correct my original post.

unforeseen

Why is the council involved at all? 

KatrinaWaves

If it’s on your land, and you’re certain of it, remove the items on your land (carefully) and place them onto their land. 

davidmcn

FlatFour said:

Hi, sorry, I miss-spoke, I meant Legal Department at the council, not planning - I will attempt to correct my original post.

Ok, on what basis is the council's legal department involved then? And what exactly is the status of the "instruction" from the council? Is it just an informal request to do something, or else?

FlatFour

Pardon me, I omitted a rather significant point - the house is rented from the Housing Association (i.e. it's a "council house" as they were once called)  hence our contacting them (aka our landlord) when the neighbour encroached into our garden.  It was the lady in their Legal Department that arranged for an independent person (surveyor? not sure of the job title off the top of my head) to assess the situation, it was this person who produced the report for the HA and we got a copy of it from the Legal Dept.

Sorry, I didn't really want to go into details about the ownership of the house at this time - we're in the process of buying it, but it's all been delayed due to the current goings on.  However, this dispute kicked off last year after we'd already started the RTB process, so we contacted them about it.  Note: I'm aware I kept saying "council" when I should be saying "Housing Association" which is likely very confusing for everyone, sorry about that.  Typing all this stuff out while feeling a bit stressed likely wasn't my best idea, I just wanted to get some advice on how to proceed.

Thanks for being patient and getting me to clarify things!

greatcrested

Do you mean your house is Housing Association,or the naughty neighbour's house?

You really need to be precise!

Assuming the property you live in is not yours, but the HAs, then it is for the HA to take action, not you. Inform them of the current osition, though I imagine at present they have more important concerns.....

If you own your own property, and the neighbours live in a HA property, then simply remove the fence, and saplings, which are trespasing on your land. Since the fence (saplings) is not yours, you must return it to the owner ie by leaving it on their land.

FlatFour

Sorry, I evidently suck at communicating this evening.  Our house is HA, neighbour's is private, though we're in the middle of a Right to Buy currently.

We will be contacting the HA once again to inform them of this, and we fully appreciate it's a low priority at the moment.  I wonder if that's why the neighbour has chosen to totally ignore what they've been asked to do and, indeed, add additional stuff (saplings) due to what's going on at the moment.

My plan is to at least make the HA's Legal Dept. aware of what's going on, then it's down to them as it's technically their land the neighbour has taken - even if we're the ones currently paying rent for it.

FreeBear

FlatFour said:  Our house is HA, neighbour's is private, though we're in the middle of a Right to Buy currently.

I would strongly recommend putting the brakes on a purchase until such time as the boundary dispute is settled. This sort of thing can get very expensive to pursue through the courts (which it may well end up doing). Keep badgering the HA until they have sorted the matter out to your satisfaction.

davidmcn

OP, if you're in the middle of a RTB then discuss with your solicitor, as obviously it would be preferable for your landlord to resolve this before going too much further.