Cases - R (on the application of Castelli) v Merton LBC
Record details
- Name
- R (on the application of Castelli) v Merton LBC
- Date
- [2013]
- Citation
- EWHC 602
- Legislation
- Keywords
- Rights of light - Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003, s. 66(1)
- Summary
-
The claimant complained to the local authority about four trees which were over 2 metres high at the edge of parkland. The local authority's response was, amongst other things, that the growth complained of was not a 'high hedge' under s. 66(1) because the trees were 'individual trees forming an edge to woodland'.
The claimant applied for judicial review, arguing that in denying that the growth was a high hedge because it was actually 'individual trees forming an edge to woodland' the local authority was applying an incorrect exception to s.66(1), because a row of trees did not cease to be a line simply because there were other trees behind them.
The claimant’s application was refused. The High Court held that, in deciding whether a particular growth amounted to a line of trees under s.66(1), it was open to the local authority to decide that it was not a high hedge by weighing up the alignment of the trees, their proximity to one another in the so-called line, and their relationship to other surrounding trees. In the instant case, the local authority's statement that the four trees were individual trees adequately explained that it thought that they did not form a line. Its comment that the trees formed an edge to woodland was a further elaboration of its opinion that the four trees did not constitute a line. The local authority had adequately concluded that the trees did not form a line, and that was a decision that it was entitled to reach.