Do we as residents have a right to light?
In England and Wales: potentially, but not automatically
A right to light is a property right, not a general personal right enjoyed simply because you are residents. It is an easement protecting sufficient natural light passing over neighbouring land through particular windows, skylights or other defined openings. The neighbouring owner must not substantially interfere with an established right.
Rights to Light
A right may arise through:
- wording in the property’s deeds or lease;
- an implied grant in certain circumstances; or
- continuous enjoyment of light for at least 20 years, commonly under section 3 of the Prescription Act 1832.
Practice guide 62A: rights to light or air
It does not normally guarantee:
- an unchanged amount of daylight;
- direct sunlight;
- light to a garden or balcony;
- preservation of a view; or
- protection against every small reduction in light.
Planning protection is separate
Even without a legally enforceable right to light, residents can object to a planning application because of loss of daylight, sunlight, overshadowing or unacceptable effects on living conditions. The local planning authority must consider whether the effect on neighbouring occupiers would be unreasonable, applying its local policies and the circumstances of the site.
Effective use of land
Planning permission does not extinguish or override a private right to light. A development can receive permission but still face a private claim, potentially resulting in compensation or an injunction restricting the work.
Rights to Light
What residents should do
Check the freehold title, leases and historic deeds; establish how long the affected windows have existed; submit any planning objection before the deadline; and obtain advice from a rights-of-light surveyor and a property solicitor before construction progresses. The person entitled to bring the private claim will generally be the relevant freeholder or leaseholder, rather than every occupier individually.
This describes England and Wales; the position differs elsewhere in the UK.
You are the owner of a bungalow amidst other bungalows. If the loss of sunlight caused by a neighbour extending their property results in little or no sunlight to part of your property and would likely manifest itself in undue damp to your property is that a reasonable reason to reject the planning application in the first place?
Yes. In England, a serious loss of daylight or sunlight to an existing bungalow can be a proper planning reason for refusing a neighbour’s extension. It is not an automatic ground for refusal, but it is unquestionably a material planning consideration. Government planning guidance specifically says councils must consider whether a proposed development would have an “unreasonable impact” on the daylight and sunlight levels enjoyed by neighbouring occupiers.
The fact that yours is a bungalow surrounded by other bungalows could make the point more significant, depending on the proposed extension. The current National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) requires development to be sympathetic to the surrounding built environment and to provide a high standard of amenity for existing as well as future occupiers. Development that is not well designed should be refused. So, for example, a substantial two-storey or otherwise high extension close to the boundary which materially overshadows a neighbouring single-storey bungalow could raise several interconnected planning issues: loss of daylight/sunlight, an overbearing or dominant effect, loss of outlook, scale and massing, and incompatibility with the established bungalow character of the area.
I would put the emphasis on loss of light, rather than damp
The possible damp is worth mentioning, but I would not make “it might cause damp” the principal objection unless you have professional evidence. A council could regard the predicted damp as speculative because damp can have several causes.
A much stronger planning case is:
“The extension would cause an unacceptable and substantial reduction in daylight and/or sunlight to the existing dwelling, resulting in unacceptable living conditions and a material loss of residential amenity.”
Then you can add that the prolonged additional shading would reduce solar warming and drying of the affected elevation/area and may increase susceptibility to damp, particularly if there is already evidence of moisture problems. If an independent building surveyor supports that proposition, it becomes considerably more persuasive.
The amount of light lost matters
There is an important distinction between an extension merely producing some extra shade and one leaving an affected part of a property with little or effectively no sunlight.
Councils commonly use the BRE’s BR 209, Site layout planning for daylight and sunlight: a guide to good practice (2022) to assess these effects. BRE confirms that the guidance covers safeguarding daylight and sunlight in existing neighbouring buildings and sunlight to gardens and amenity areas, and that local authorities widely use it when assessing planning applications.
Consequently, if the proposed extension would substantially affect, for example:
- the principal window to a living room, dining room or bedroom;
- several windows on the affected side of your bungalow;
- a conservatory or other regularly occupied room;
- the principal usable part of your rear garden; or
- an already relatively enclosed part of the dwelling which would become substantially darker,
that is much more significant than the loss of sunlight to, say, a driveway, blank wall or secondary window.
And the council can refuse on those grounds
The council doesn’t have to establish that you possess a legal “right to light.” That private-law right is actually separate and is not itself a material planning consideration. Government guidance specifically distinguishes private rights to light from planning considerations.
The planning question is instead:
Would this extension cause an unreasonable loss of daylight/sunlight and therefore an unacceptable deterioration in the residential amenity and living conditions of the neighbouring bungalow?
If the answer on the evidence is yes, that can support refusal of the planning application in the first instance, particularly where a less harmful design could reasonably be adopted. National policy requires planning decisions to safeguard healthy living conditions and acceptable standards of amenity.
