Protected trees are more common in Surrey and north-east Hampshire than most homeowners expect, and the rules apply to trees in private gardens just as much as to those on public land. This guide explains what a Tree Preservation Order prohibits, what a conservation area adds, and the notice a council expects before work starts.
What a Tree Preservation Order actually does
A Tree Preservation Order is made by a local planning authority to protect a specific tree, a group of trees, an area or a woodland. Once an order is in place it is an offence to cut down, top, lop, uproot, wilfully damage or wilfully destroy the tree without written consent. The protection travels with the tree rather than the owner, so it continues to apply after a property changes hands.
The scope is wider than people assume. Pruning is covered, not only felling, so a crown reduction, a crown lift or the removal of a single limb needs consent in the same way. Severing roots during building work can amount to wilful damage. An order applies to the whole of a tree that straddles a boundary, so a neighbour’s protected tree overhanging your garden cannot simply be cut back to the line.
Finding out whether your tree is protected
The local planning authority holds the register, and asking them is free. Which council depends on where you are: Guildford Borough Council covers Ash, Tongham and Normandy, Waverley Borough Council covers Farnham and Godalming, Rushmoor Borough Council covers Aldershot and Farnborough, and Surrey Heath Borough Council covers Camberley and Frimley. Several publish an online map of protected trees, and all will answer a written enquiry about a specific address.
Ask two questions rather than one: whether the tree is covered by an order, and whether the property sits within a conservation area. They are separate forms of protection with different procedures, and a tree can be subject to both. Where a map shows a woodland or area order, check whether your tree falls inside the boundary as drawn, because area orders can cover everything that was standing when the order was made.
Confirm the answer in writing and keep the reply. If a contractor tells you a tree is clear without having checked with the council, that is worth pressing, because liability for unauthorised work sits with the owner of the tree as well as with the person holding the saw. Councils are used to the question and will usually respond quickly.
Applying for consent to work on a protected tree
Consent is applied for on a standard form, submitted through the Planning Portal or directly to the council, and there is no fee. The application needs to identify the tree clearly, describe the work in proper terms and give the reasons for it. Vague wording such as "cut back" tends to invite a request for more detail, which costs weeks, so a specific description, for example a crown reduction of a stated amount back to suitable growth points, is far more useful.
Authorities normally aim to determine an application within eight weeks of a valid submission, and supporting evidence helps where the case rests on condition or damage. A decision may grant consent, grant it subject to conditions such as replacement planting, or refuse it, with a right of appeal to the Planning Inspectorate. Plan the timing into the job: applying in late summer leaves room for the determination period before dormant-season work.
Conservation areas and the six weeks’ notice
In a conservation area, trees that are not already covered by an order still have interim protection. Anyone intending to cut down, top or lop such a tree must give the local planning authority six weeks’ written notice, known as a section 211 notice, before starting. The notice period exists so the authority can decide whether to make a Tree Preservation Order. If six weeks pass with no order and no objection, the work described in the notice can go ahead, generally within two years.
There is a size threshold. The requirement applies to trees with a stem diameter above 75mm measured at 1.5 metres from the ground, with a larger allowance of 100mm where the work is thinning to help the growth of other trees. Hedges of shrub species are a separate matter, though a hedge containing a tree of that size is not. If you are unsure, measure the stem and ask.
Exemptions, and why relying on them is risky
The legislation provides exemptions, principally for trees that are dead and for work urgently necessary to remove an immediate risk of serious harm. There is also an exemption where work is needed to abate a statutory nuisance. These are narrower than they sound. "Dead" means the whole tree, not a tree in decline, and the dangerous-tree exemption covers only what is necessary to remove the immediate danger.
The exemptions carry their own notice requirements. For a dead tree, five working days’ written notice to the authority is generally required before the work takes place. Where the work genuinely could not wait, notice must be given as soon as practicable afterwards. A duty to plant a replacement tree usually follows the removal of a protected tree under these provisions.
The practical risk is that the burden of proof sits with you. If the council disagrees that the tree was dead or dangerous, you are the one explaining it after the tree has gone. Dated photographs taken from several angles before the work, together with a written assessment, are the difference between a defensible decision and a difficult conversation.
Planning-condition trees on newer estates
Trees on recent developments are often protected by a planning condition rather than by an order, and the two are easy to confuse. A condition attached to the permission may require specified trees and hedgerows to be retained and maintained, sometimes for a set number of years after completion, and may tie in a landscape plan showing what was planted where. Breaching a condition is an enforcement matter for the council.
Because these trees do not appear on a TPO map, homeowners on newer estates often assume there is nothing to check. The decision notice for the original permission is the document to look at, and it is usually available through the council’s online planning register under the site address. Management companies on shared estates may also hold obligations of their own over communal planting.
Penalties, and the sensible order of events
Carrying out work on a protected tree without consent is a criminal offence. For cutting down, uprooting, destroying or wilfully damaging a tree in a way likely to destroy it, the offence can be tried in either court, and on conviction on indictment the fine is unlimited. Lesser breaches attract lower maximum fines. Courts take account of any financial benefit gained, and a duty to replant can follow regardless.
None of this needs to be alarming. The order of events is to establish the status of the tree first, apply or give notice as required, wait for the determination or the notice period, then do the work. Where a tree is protected we deal with the paperwork before anything is cut, and we would always suggest confirming the position with your own local planning authority, since practice varies between councils.