Between the 1st of January 2020 and the 1st of January 2023, please provide the below requested information for contraventions reported against trees and hedges protected through Tree Preservation Orders, Conservation areas, and Hedgerow Regulations. Please work from the 1st of January 2020 to most recent, should the free FOI time limit be met, please state at what year/month this was met and return. Please input answers next to the below requests. Please provide numerical data for:

1. The number of tree/hedgerow contraventions reported.
204

2. The number of tree/hedgerow contraventions pursued to magistrates and/or crown court.
0. Although 1 high hedge complaint was successfully prosecuted in the Magistrate’s Court during that time. Although the actual court appearance was postponed, at the request of the accused’s solicitor, to January 6th 2023.

3. The number of tree/hedgerow contraventions closed with no action deemed necessary.
180 (either ‘no breach’ or ‘not expedient in the light of the public interest test’)

4. The number of tree/hedgerow contraventions where a decision to take action or not was reached within 6 months of the case being registered.
We don’t hold that information. However, we do hold information that shows there were there were 37 cases that ran on past 182 days although this may in some cases include the time for the completion of the action that the Council required to rectify the issue.

5. The number of tree/hedgerow contraventions closed through serving of tree replacement notices, or voluntary tree planting.
In 11 cases Council action elicited an application to rectify the issue, in 10 cases there was voluntary compliance, in 3 cases a notice was served.