• I WAS surprised to read that Camden planning recognises the importance of trees, (Trees are so important to our wellbeing, April 11). My experience suggests the contrary.

The department was not interested when the purchaser of the house next door to us cut down all the trees and shrubs in the back garden to make way for a large out-building at one end and a much-enlarged back extension at the other for which he did not then have planning permission and about which he had not informed the neighbours.

When, some months into the work, the owner finally applied for planning permission we were able to see from the planning website that before starting the work the owner had a pre-planning meeting (which involves only planning officials and requires no notification to be given to those affected) after which he received from the planner a favourable report which, among other surprising comments, said the trees destroyed were “of no amenity value”.

While the trees did not belong to protected species they had value to us and our neighbours since birds nested in them, they screened the houses from each other and provided a green outlook for five neighbouring houses which now look out onto the bare roof of the out-building. The replacement of most of the rear space with buildings has also interrupted the green corridor previously created by a line of gardens.

We and neighbours put in objections to the scale of the work but the case was not referred to a planning meeting and the plans, the purpose of which is to enlarge one house not to create additional housing, were waved through by officials, apparently without scrutiny from elected representatives.

The process, with its lack of transparency and absence of concern for the wider environmental impact or the wellbeing of neighbours seems in contradiction to the aims put forward by Councillor Adam Harrison (Three steps to carbon neutrality, April 11). Is it time that the council took a hard look at its planning department?

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