Common Law Nuisance? Dog next door barking and crying all day indoors.

[morag-janet-of-the-hill-family]

It depends what you want the outcome to be. If you want the dog to stop howling and you think he is mistreating the animal then maybe you could go to the SPCA and get them to do a check? If you complete a private 3 step notice with him you might have to take him to court to resolve it if he won’t stick to the terms of the agreement. It all depends how much time and energy you have for this issue and what the potential repercussions could be for you. Just weigh up all of the factors before proceeding.

[Mark-owen]

Thanks morag-janet,

I’m willing to spend time and effort on it. This is a new neighbour and we feel this could only be the start of a problematic relationship with her.

I’ve done 3-notice procedures before but they were all conditional acceptences – so any tips on what to call this type of Notice?

Thanks, Mark

[morag-janet-of-the-hill-family]

My suggestion is; it would still be a conditional acceptance of whatever she has said to you in reply to your approaches. You probably already know that it would be best to include an affidavit to establish the facts of the matter. What is the outcome you are hoping for and if she ignores everything you do what will you do once you have established a private agreement with her?

[Mark-owen]

We live in a semi-detached house with a common wall between us – so we can clearly hear the dog through the wall. Having spoken to neighbours on the other side, and even opposite across the road, they too can hear the dog – so a joint private action is a possibility. When we spoke to the neighbour we said we could hear the dog through the day and into the night and asked if the dog was OK. The response was hostile and she basically said get used to it. She also seemed to lie about the fact that she was at the house more often than she was. If she was there then I doubt the dog would be howling and whining as often. This is a troubled individual who has lost her kids due to her drug habit – we were told that much by her uncle who is known to us (but has no intention to interceded).

I thought we could do an affidavit with the first Notice and presuming no response or rebuttal to the three Notices we would eventually go to the clerk of the magistrate and ask for a summary judgement. Regarding the process of summary judgement I have no idea if this is realistic, just I’ve heard this is a possibility.

I also thought that we could add a Schedule of Fees with, eg, £100/day for every incurrence of a day subjected to distressing noise.

We are also pursuing other avenues. We are talking to the local council, and the RSPCA (UK) but the RSPCA require 24-hour monitoring and reporting – difficult if you need to go out of the house for any length of time – and the council can be hit-and-miss depending on what time they visit.

I don’t like or enjoy the prospect of suing anyone but I feel that getting experience in private law is a good thing and in some ways more true to who we really are.

[morag-janet-of-the-hill-family]

See reply below

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[Mark-owen]

Many thanks for that morag-janet.