Situation: We want to buy a house which we really like. The only drawback is that there is a 12' high leylandi hedge, located about 12' widthways from the back of the house. It more or less runs the entire length and appears to be designed to obviously give privacy to a nearby bungalow.

The hedge is situated (just) on the neighbour's property and appears to be well trimmed. But it blocks out an awful lot of natural light to the rear of the property in which we are interested.

Question: If we were to buy the house, would the neigbour be forced by law in any way to reduce the height of the hedge to afford more natural light onto our house? Oh, the property is in Northern Ireland.

Thanks for any replies,