Realistically, how much could I actually be fined for trimming neighbours trees without permission?

[Wafflington]

Essentially the situation I am in:

I live in a house where the neighbours behind me is a landlord who doesn't give 2 shits about their property. They have a large conifer tree hedge which they've allowed to grow to something stupid like 30ft, which is pissing off both myself and our neighbours. The landlord is impossible to contact and simply ignores all messages or attempts (I pity the tenants at the property who have to deal with him!)

What would be the possible amount I'd be fined if we just trimmed the trees anyway without his permission? That's assuming he either 1. Noticed it in the first place (I doubt he ever even thinks about the property unless its about when the rent will be paid) and 2. Cared enough to bother kicking up a fuss 3. Could prove it was us anyway

Other background info:

We have the full co-operation of the tenants who are happy for us to pay to trim the trees and let in the tree surgeons to do so. We aren't asking scummy landlord to pay half (even though he should) and are paying it all ourselves. Council are especially useless and don't care, we could pay them £400 to "investigate" which will probably lead to nothing, so it honestly feels less risky to just chance it and cut the trees without permission. Previous home owners we are 99% certain simply paid to have the trees trimmed without permission and has never been an issue. The trees aren't protected and we aren't lopping then down, just trimming them back about 8ft to the height they were ~2 years ago, as the landlord has left them to grow unchecked for as long as we can tell.

I suppose other option is to trim the trees from all 4 surrounding houses boundaries (as all the surrounding neighbours are with us and sick of these damn trees) and leave Mr Scummy Landlord with a bunch of horribly disfigured trees that have been trimmed exactly back to his boundary in accordance with our legal rights. But this would also leave us with some very strange disfigured trees in view of our garden, and would still block a fair amount of our, and our neighbours, light.

Thoughts?? I don't really care about the morality of whether I should or shouldn't do this, as far as I'm concerned and based on tenants comments, this landlord is happy to take rent from these tenants and completely avoids any and all responsibility or contact regarding maintaining the property (mouldy rooms, broken light switches, etc). I have 0 moral qualms cutting some trees back that belong to a person who treats their tenants and neighbours like shit. 👍

Would the tenants not be responsible for the maintenance? If so then if you’ve got their agreement I’m not sure what the problem is (other than setting a precedent that you’ll fork out for the continued maintenance).

Edit: the landlord hasn't refused us permission to cut the trees, he simply doesn't talk to us at all when we try. Tenants have complained he is impossible to contact and ignores all phone calls, voice mail, emails etc unless it suits him

Allegedly, you could be prosecuted for trespassing. In reality, if he found out and went to the police they'd brush him off with "this is a civil matter, have you tried contacting a solicitor?". I used to be that poor junior solicitor who had to deal with these enquiries. Nobody ever wanted to take it further than a stern letter warning a neighbour not to trespass again, most didn't even want to do that. It's just a lot of money to spend for nothing.

It was my understanding that we needed the landlord, not the tenants, permission to do this. Honestly I don't even care about the money of paying it all ourselves, I just want them bloody cut back! If all we need is the tenants "yes, go for it" then we 100% have that!

Get a decent company in to do the lopping and get them to sort out any permission required.
My neighbours and I had the trees at the end of our garden done this spring. Trees are protected and not on our land but affect us a lot.
Council can grant permission and notify landowners. Ours didn't mind us doing the work (and paying for it). No problem all round.
You can check yourself if the trees are protected, they will either have a TPO (tree preservation order) or need to be a certain girth or height (not sure which,) to have default protection.
Even protected trees can be trimmed though.

That was also my concern, but how do you prove trespassing if the tenants gave permission to enter the garden? Surely the landlord can't dictate who the tenant can/cannot allow in their garden whilst renting so trespassing would be difficult to prove?

Not quite sure who you think would fine you if you went ahead. None of the surrounding residents would report it although you might get a nearby tree hugger complaining, presumably to the council but don't think they can do anything if there is no TPO.
It would only become an issue if the landlord reported you to the police for criminal damage but is that likely?
If you are doing it I would be inclined to chop it right down to the ground so it won't grow again and you don't have the same problem a few years down the line and replace it with something more suitable for a garden.
If it was me I would just go ahead.

I'm a tenant and completely responsible for the garden. I am wondering whether the landlord has told the tenants they can cut them back if they want to, but they don't want to pay for it.

I’m not sure of the full legalities re the trees, but my concern is that given the LL is already unreasonable, that he would vengefully try to evict the tenants if he found out they had given permission that isn’t theirs to give.

It seems a big risk for the tenants to take.

It would be fairer to have all the work done from yours/ neighbours sides of the fence, unless all parties are prepared to say that the tree surgeons let themselves in or found the gate open so that the tenants are not implicated.

Ideally you need to find a tree surgeon who will deem them unsafe.

The other thing to be aware of is of provoking some kind of dispute that you need to disclose if you are selling the house. But I get that the trees and the LL are a real nuisance.

We rent and have complete jusistiction over the garden. We had it landscaped in the summer and put up new 8ft fencing all round. He was very grateful.

It's difficult to say with absolute certainty, because it depends upon their tenancy agreement, but nearly all model agreements contain clauses that the tenant is responsible for keeping the garden in good order. Providing you have the tenants agreement (preferably in writing, an email will be fine) I can't see you would have any issues.

Depends how much he cares. I've had cases like this in the past and we used CAVAT assessments to provide a monetary value, before and after the work, which is the starting point for compensation numbers. But if he doesn't care he probably won't go that far. He'll probably be grateful somebody else is paying to manage his trees.