AT LAST a glimmer of sense from a councillor – Matt Barber of the Vale pointing out that Oxford should “look at sites they want to use for employment, because there is no point in encouraging economic growth if you can’t provide the housing needed to support it” (City struggles to find room, April 20). 

This is a paradox the city council has consistently refused to face in its blind rush to make Oxford bigger and grander – though not, I fear, better.

They never trouble to ask us residents whether we want this expansion, trampling the Green Belt and the city’s desirable ambience.

In the same issue you highlight the implications for even more growth of the proposed expressway to Cambridge. Firstly, why build a new road across countryside when upgrading the existing route via Bicester,

Buckingham, MK and Bedford would be cheaper and easier, as much of it is already dualled? Wouldn’t spending on reinstating the railway be money better spent and discourage rather than encourage traffic? Why encourage more growth in an area of near full employment when so much of the North is in desperate need of jobs to replace dying industries?

Pundits wonder why people vote for Brexit, UKIP, Trump, Le Pen etc – but is it surprising that so many are driven to try alternatives when those in power are so blatantly incapable of joined-up thinking and listening to the public’s views?

ANTHONY CHEKE
Oxford