Or are my elderly mum's neighbours?

[GracieGrowler]

My mum is a council tenant, has a house she's lived in for 50+ years on a nice estate where most of the houses are now privately owned, including the one adjoining her. She's 83 and a keen gardener, but goes for the cottage garden/wild roses look.
Her neighbours are total arseholes. In their late 50s both physically fit and capable but spend their days moaning and complaining. Every year at around this time they start putting letter thru her door about issues such as ivy over growing (I looked, it was literally 2 leaves) or her hedge. It upsets her terribly and makes her scared to be outside. In the past they have shouted and screamed at her and threatened her, and she thinks they poisoned a fox cub that she found dead.
They've just sent a new letter complaining that her hedge is too high and spoiling their view (of a road). It's probably about 5 foot tall at most. Do they have any grounds to complain and make her cut it legally, or can she just ignore them? It's not going over to their side of the property

The height restriction is for only for fences walls etc but not hedges/trees /shrubs.

No photo.
I was addressing other posters who said to go round.
I've just found this which is interesting and states a 'high hedge' is one over 6 foot tall which hers def isn't

www.rhs.org.uk/plants/types/hedges/nuisance-overgrown

ok so my advice - refer them to HA

And if you can get a photo and post here…. we will have a better idea of what HA will conclude

You are right @GracieGrowler . Hedges are only potentially considered a problem over 6 foot.
The 1 foot rule at the front of a house applies to fences.

How dare they intimidate her outside and try to deprive her of her gardening hobby. It is a wonderful activity, great for body and mind especially for older people. I really hope you get them to back TF off.

If the neighbours are also social housing tenants, I'd report them to the HA/council. Your DM is a vulnerable, elderly person and they are harassing her. Their behaviour is anti-social.

And I'd start keeping a diary of every incident, with dates, times etc.

Her neighbours should try living next door to my elderly MIL's neighbours. They haven't touched their back garden in the 15 years or so they've lived there, and it's completely overgrown. The clematis montana that the previous occupier planted has colonised the garden to such an extent that it's growing 2/3 of the way up a mature silver birch that is taller than the house, and all along the back fence of MIL's. She doesn't object, she thinks it lovely (which it does).

Your DM's garden sounds similar to MIL's. She has over 50 different roses, delphiniums, lupins and foxgloves and it really is a lovely cottagey garden.

💐

I’d report them to the HA and explain they are intimidating your poor mum

Can you provide a link for this claim?

That’s not true. In relation to a hedge, there is no maximum legal height in the UK

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/over-the-garden-hedge/over-the-garden-hedge#:~:text=You%20don't%20normally%20need,a%20nuisance%20to%20anyone%20else.

This is false.
No one will even consider the height of a hedge as an issue unless it is over 2 metres. Your mum's hedge is lower than this.

Miriad · Today 14:58
The legal height for a front garden fence or hedge in the UK is 1m (3.2ft). If it’s taller you need planning permission.

It is 2m from ground level.
Any shorter than that and the council jobsworths won't even don a hi-vis.

Are your mums neighbours also council tenants? If so, I think it's worth contacting them if they've shouted at your mum recently, especially as it sounds as if she's vulnerable due to her age and some possible memory issues.

Re. the hedge height, as long as it's not in the front where it could potentially block visibility of people pulling on to the road, or there's nothing in her tenancy re hedge heights, then 5 foot is very reasonable.

May depend on the estate as to whether they're allowed. Our estate has restrictions on hedges at all in front gardens and within a certain distance of any walkway/road. It's not really policed, but not many people have them anyway.

There isn’t some general law that you can’t have a 5ft hedge so the only recourse they would have is if it’s not allowed by the HA or there’s some restrictive covenant on the property saying something about hedge height!

it seems vanishingly unlikely so I think you can just assume they have no legal right to get her to cut her hedge unless they tell you otherwise, in which case you can investigate further.

You say she lives on an estate. Are there neighbours who can advocate for her?
I think on my little cul-de-sac if we became aware that an elderly woman living on her own was being harassed and bullied in this way, people would step in.

You could contact your mother's local authority's adult safeguarding team and report that these neighbours are harassing, bullying and threatening your mother on a regular basis and are by their actions preventing her from the rightful and peaceful enjoyment of her garden. Tell them that your mother is so frightened of them that she won't go outside anymore.

Your could also report the bullying and harassment to the police. Start a trail in as many places as possible in the hope that someone starts to take this seriously and there is then a record of this couple's behaviour. They are both heartless bastards and frankly they need someone to make them disappear - plastic grass indeed.

Hi OP, speak to her local councillor, ask them to come and look and tell them of the elder abuse.

Also https://www.gardenlaw.co.uk for good advice. Some of them have been there years and are arborists, professionals.

Her garden sounds fine. They can cut any overhang back to the boundary, no further. They can't cut down her hedge - that's for the local authority to consider ONLY if it's a nuisance and it doesn't sound as though it is.

NDN can offer her back ( old law) the cuttings (arisings) if they've trimmed back but she can decline to take them. They can't dump cuttings on her property or make her dispose of anything they've trimmed.

Also the likes of https://www.ageuk.org.uk/ can offer support, including possible help with the garden.

I'm so sorry that she is having such a horrible time. I hope that all the advice so far can help. She's doing nothing wrong from what you say but do get other organisations, including the police if needs be, involved. Best wishes.

Thanks for all the responses. The neighbours own their house. I will definitely be responding to them and will look into a safeguarding officer too. Reassuring to see that most people think she isn't doing anything wrong. Her garden is beautiful (& smells amazing at the moment)

Pay a couple of knuckleheads to go round and drop the pair of fuckers

@GracieGrowler its not that people think your mum isn’t doing anything wrong -it’s a legal fact! I hope she gets peace from them

I believe it's illegal to cut hedges till end of August now anyway.

So sorry your mum is going through this, would make complaints to the police if she feels harassed. Each and every time there's an issue.

You can contact the housing officer and the council can deal with it they can get their legal department involved "asking" them .not to harass their tenant. Please phone them on Monday on your mum's behalf

Also this.

No it isn't. Different councils have differen bye-laws.

My old neighbours were like this. All plastic garden gnomes and fake topiary balls. Whereas we had wildflowers, a pond, compost bin etc. They said our garden attracted pests. They meant bees. In truth I think it just showed them up tbh as their patch of 1cm long grass was riddled with leatherjackets and dog poo. I wouldn't even comment on it if we hadn't had to move because of their harassment. You're either a gardener or youre not, and nothing wrong with either, but live and let live. I love a cottage garden, and ivy! I wish I had a neighbour like your mum! Legally all she has to do is check her tenancy agreement. I'm on the residents panel of the housing ombudsman and I successfully sued my ex housing association for not dealing with my old neighbours- if that counts for anything. I would say that if her garden is looked after and there is no rubbish, they can just keep complaining. If they've done or shouted anything at her then she needs to report it now to the antisocial behaviour team at her council. Even if she decides she doesn't want them to take action. That way if they complain maliciously or they do anything else, then there is a record of what they did. They'll probably only offer mediation, and the neighbour's complaints would look very petty so they won't do that. That's probably the worst (legal) thing they could do and the complaint has no basis so don't worry. Your mum's garden sounds very much like mine - I've worked hard this year to get it back to how my old one was. One of my neighbours doesn't really like it and have made comments but that just made me more determined tbh. It's very strange coming up the street to see lawn, lawn, lawn, my cottage garden, gravel, lawn. I love it. It's like a big green hairy wart on the grey landscape 😄