Hey folks,

After years of peaceful living in small town of North Canterbury we finally have a dispute with our neighbour, someone who has relocated to a tiny plot next door after EQC payout for his red zone ChCh property. Branches and leaves from our trees are blowing over to his property. He has collected them and dumped them back over our side of the fence. Is he legally entitled to do this?

I will definitely call Hurunui District Council to confirm his entitlement but I just thought I'd ask for anyone who has had previous experience. My thinking is once it's blown off our property we cannot be responsible for disposal, right? If trees planted by councils on sidewalks shed leaves onto our property can we just dump it on the roadside and expect the council to clean it up?

I'm more than happy to be proven wrong and no problem telling him about his entitlement, whatever that may be. Normally I wouldn't even worry about it and let him have it, if he wasn't being such a tw*t about it! There are ways of discussing things with one's neighbour... some of them are less-than-neighbourly. His was one of those!

Cheers,
D.