>> I had on at least two separate occasions to rod my downstream neighbour's section of the foul drain, as he had root intrusion he wouldn't fix
I had a similar experience prior to the change to shared drain responsibiities.
I lived in close of 13 houses in a private road when the drains backed up at 8 of the houses. We didn't have a drainage plan and it was urgent. I organised the unblocking and by prior agreement collected about £50 per house to pay for it.
Some time later I figured out that the eight houses were on one connection that went to a main to the south while five of us were connected via another shared pipe to a main to the east.
I gave everybody a copy of the drainage plan and suggested that in case of future problems all the houses upstream of any blockage would have to share the cost (as was the convention at the time) rather than involving all 13.
Sure enough it happened a couple of years later, the 8 houses again had a blockage and two of them came to me to sort it out. I said I wasn't actually involved as my drain went the other way and left them to it.
They 'elected' a resident to sort it. He got a contractor in who put a camera down and found a collapse halfway across a field behind their back gardens. Quote was c. £2,000 to dig hole and replace 6ft of pipe. The job was done, and the bill duly sent. The resident in question argued the toss because they had only used 3ft of new pipe. Contractor said, not unreasonably, it made no difference - same hole, same machine, same gang, same time, same price. Resident - a man of uncertain temper whose house was named Llamedos (read it backwards) - refused to pay. This went on for months. He ended up with a CCJ. Very glad I ducked that one.
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