TREE  LIABILITY  SURVEYS

‘You must take reasonable care to avoid acts of omissions which you can reasonably forsee would be likely to injure your neighbour’ Lord Atkin’s ruling in Donoghue v Stevenson 1932

 
Landowners have a duty of care in law to take steps to ensure trees on their land are safe. 

 While it is commonly recognised that trees can be unpredictable, it is possible to identify where they cause a hazard and to measure the element of risk to the public and seek to address that risk.  

Our initial assessment of the tree hazards on the land is approached from a legal stance.  We seek to:

•  Establish the client’s actual duty of care and the standard of care expected of them.

• Assess where there is a breach of that duty linked to the risk of trees failing and causing damage or injury to the public.
• Make the client aware of the concept of contributory damage by themselves and discuss the  ‘minors’ factor
• Assess whether the trees are a nuisance to others by preventing reasonable enjoyment of their property
• Visit the ‘strict liability’ aspects of seeking permission to have work carried out to trees where required.

All of the above are necessary to prevent unnecessary expense through expensive data collection in order to ensure the client is protected and thus able to mitigate their liability in a court of law if necessary.

 The on-site Tree Health Check is individual assessments of trees where risk  is likely and we use the Quantified Tree Risk Assessment system which is based on methodology that of the concept of ‘target values’.  The principles of the system are in line with others applied to industrial and workplace risk.

For more information please email us on: info@treeliability.co.uk