Crosswords1 min ago
Is This Bureaucracy Gone Mad?
42 Answers
Here we have two cases, one where they are thinking of removing the rights of light through our windows, and the other where a farmer has built a lovely building, and just because he failed to get planning permission he will be forced to knock it down.
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It's more ancient than 1832. The Prescription Act 1832, s3, only laid down the length of time for which the use had to have existed, without consent and uninterrupted, before it was legal enforceable as a right. This law was necessary because the existing law acknowledged rights to exist if they had been exercised since "time immemorial". Technically,this was the year 1189, but in practice was established by a rather vague proof along the lines of nobody ever recording any stopping of the practice. The sign 'Ancient Lights' on buildings date from this time.
The common law provided for such an easement or right long before this. It is known to exist by 1611 because Lord Justice Wray, in that year,distinguished between it and the right to a view, a prospect, from a window. He acknowledged the first existed but denied the existence of the second. That remains planning law now.
The question is should a householder be able in future to establish the right to total light to any window, unaffected by any shadowing or permanent reduction, in perpetuity, because his house becomes 20 years old?Or is the right to be subject only to practical considerations of need to a given amount of light or none, which is the present law and practice where no right to light has been claimed by 20 years prescriptive use?
The common law provided for such an easement or right long before this. It is known to exist by 1611 because Lord Justice Wray, in that year,distinguished between it and the right to a view, a prospect, from a window. He acknowledged the first existed but denied the existence of the second. That remains planning law now.
The question is should a householder be able in future to establish the right to total light to any window, unaffected by any shadowing or permanent reduction, in perpetuity, because his house becomes 20 years old?Or is the right to be subject only to practical considerations of need to a given amount of light or none, which is the present law and practice where no right to light has been claimed by 20 years prescriptive use?
