Summary: We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint about the Council’s decision not to take further action regarding the height of her neighbour Ms Y’s hedge, and about its contacts with her and complaint-handling. There is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s decision-making process, nor injustice caused to Miss X by the outcome, to warrant an investigation. We do not investigate council correspondence and complaint-handling where we are not investigating the core issue giving rise to the complaint.

The complaint

1. Miss X lives next door to Ms Y. Their back garden shared boundary is marked by a hedge. The Council ordered Ms Y to reduce its height to 7.9 feet in 2020, serving a remedial notice. Miss X says the neighbour has breached the notice at least three times since 2020. She complains the Council:
1. failed to take action against the neighbour for the latest high hedge breach she reported;
2. made unreasonable demands on her to provide evidence of the breach;
3. ignored the information about the hedge she has been able to provide;
4. failed to properly reply to her reports and complaints.
2. Miss X says the matter has cost her time and caused her trouble from chasing the Council for updates and action. She says the hedge not being reduced results in a lack of sunlight to her property. Miss X wants the Council to make the neighbour comply with the 2020 notice, review her evidence about the hedge and improve its responses to contacts and complaints.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. The Ombudsman investigates complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or may decide not to continue with an investigation if we decide:
• there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating; or
• any injustice is not significant enough to justify our involvement.

(Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))

4. We consider whether there was fault in the way an organisation made its decision. If there was no fault in the decision making, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered information from Miss X, and the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

6. Where someone applies for and obtains a remedial notice for a neighbour’s high hedge, they pay the council for that service. But once the notice has been issued, that payment does not entitle the applicant to any particular council enforcement service. Officers dealing with allegations of breaches in their area are required to prioritise reports received based on the potential levels of harm an alleged breach could cause to the wider public and to individuals, not on whether a previous service has involved a cost to the person reporting a breach.
7. I note Miss X considers the Council or her neighbour Ms Y should be required to prove there has been no breach of the remedial notice, rather than her having to give evidence to prove her claim of a breach. It is for Miss X as the person alleging a breach to provide that information. Councils cannot proactively ‘police’ alleged breaches of high hedge remedial notices and do not have a duty to do so. Once they receive a report, they are required to gather evidence to see whether any breach has occurred and if there is a breach, decide what action to take. As part of their decision‑making process, they will ask the person making the breach allegation to provide information. There is not enough evidence here that the Council was at fault for asking Miss X to provide evidence of the alleged breach to justify an investigation.
8. I recognise Miss X may be annoyed and frustrated that a breach of the notice would mean Ms Y is not complying its terms. But that frustration and annoyance is not caused by Council fault. It is caused by the actions or inactions of Ms Y in, as Miss X perceives, not proactively complying with the notice’s terms.
9. The Council’s correspondence with Miss X shows officers did not ignore the information she provided. They noted her claim that parts of the hedge were over seven feet in height, and that the remedial notice was for the hedge to be under 7.9 feet high. Officers determined that on Miss X’s evidence, there was no breach. There is not enough evidence that officers failed to take proper account of the information Miss X provided to warrant an investigation.
10. In January 2023 as part of its complaint response the Council visited and measured the parts of the hedge covered by the remedial notice. They found that apart from a few isolated stems, and a clump of about 25 stems, the hedge was under the required height. Officers estimated the length of the hedge which was over that height was about five percent. They had already sent a reminder letter to Ms Y in November 2022 to maintain the hedge in compliance with the notice. After the information and measurements gathered at the visit, officers decided there were no grounds to take further enforcement actions against Ms Y because the impact of the higher parts of the hedge on the level of light reaching Miss X’s property would be likely to be imperceptible. They decided the level of harm caused by the breach was insufficient to justify further action.
11. We may only go behind a council’s decision where there is evidence of fault in the decision-making process and where, but for that fault, a different decision would have been made. In response to Miss X’s reports and the complaint, officers appropriately requested and considered her evidence of a breach of the remedial notice and gathered relevant evidence on a site visit. They prioritised the matter based on the evidence received and the potential level of impact a breach of the notice would have. There is not enough evidence of fault by the Council in its enforcement decision here to justify an investigation. I recognise Miss X disagrees with the decision and wants the Council to enforce. But it is not fault for a council to properly make a decision with which someone disagrees.
12. Even if the Council were at fault in not enforcing here, we would not investigate. I say this because the length of hedge over the height in the remedial notice, as evidenced from the site visit, shows the shadowing impact and harm caused to Miss X’s property is minimal. There is insufficient evidence of a significant injustice being caused to Miss X by the Council’s enforcement decision here to justify us investigating.
13. Miss X complains about the Council’s correspondence when she was reporting the alleged breach and during the complaint. We do not investigate councils’ correspondence and internal complaint-handling processes where we are not investigating the core issue which gave rise to the complaint. It is not a good use of our resources to do so. That limitation applies here so we will not investigate this part of the complaint.

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Final decision

14. We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint because:
• there is not enough evidence of fault in the process the Council used to decide not to take further enforcement action regarding Ms Y’s hedge to warrant an investigation; and
• there is insufficient significant personal injustice caused to her by the Council’s decision to justify us investigating; and
• we do not investigate councils’ correspondence and complaint-handling where we are not investigating the core issue which gave rise to the complaint.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman