So, you have a telecoms mast on your land and you want to get rid of it, but what are your options?
First look at your lease, do you have any rights to break? If so, do you have to give a certain minimum period of notice and/or are there conditions attached, say the requirement to have planning permission granted for a redevelopment? If no break clauses are available until the end of the agreement, then your only choice may be to either wait or enter into negotiations with the Operator to move them. If you take this option, be fully aware that the Operator is likely to make you pay for literally everything, including not only the removal of the equipment from your site, but also finding and building a new installation.
Secondly, has the agreement been contracted out of the Landlord & Tenant Act 1954? If the answer is 'no', your solicitor will have to serve not only a contractual break notice but a statutory Section 25 Notice, which itself has specific timing issues that must be complied with in order to be valid. A protected business tenancy does complicate matters as the landlord would automatically have to go to court for the removal of the protected business tenancy, and payment of compensation to the Tenant is likely if successful. Legal advice should be sought on this matter.
Once the notice(s) have been served upon the Tenant, in order for an Operator to protect their statutory rights under the Telecommunications Act 1984 (as amended by the Communications Act 2003) they must serve a counter notice under Schedule 2, paragraph 21(3), within 28 days of receiving the termination notice. Whilst this notice is often served, the Operators will generally work with the landlord to relocate their equipment.
What happens if the Operator refuses to move despite negotiation? Excluding any complication with the lease being protected under the Landlord & Tenant Act 1954, if the Operator has served a counter notice to protect their statutory rights, then the only option would be to go to court. With few court cases to date it is assumed that upon applying to the County Court the judge would decide whose requirement is greater. If the Operator is successful, compensation to the Landlord is likely to be in the form of a yearly rent similar to that already being paid.
So do not leave it to the last minute if you are thinking about redevelopment which will require the removal of some telecommunications equipment – expert advice should be sought at the earliest opportunity. Apart from the terms of the existing lease, the most important factors in the successful relocation of telecom equipment are the time and persistence it will take to push the Operator to find an alternative site. It takes time to agree terms, gain planning permission, build and integrate the new installation into the Operator’s network, before any site will be decommissioned.
If you require more information, or wish to discuss this further with a member of our Telecoms team, please contact Mark Newton, Chris Hicks or Eve Watson on 01858 410200 or email telecoms@fishergerman.co.uk
