Sir, Stephen Webb’s letter in the Herald promoting the use of brown-field sites shows a wholly naïve misunderstanding of their use in relation to meeting the appalling the housing targets being imposed upon the region as a result of the Strategic Housing Market Assessment.

At present councils are required to identify land supply for new housing and in order to appease the developers (who do not want the costs associated with brown-field land) and promote rapid building, are overwhelmingly favouring green-field sites. Just look at the proposals in the proposed new Local Plans for both SODC and Vale DC — almost all of the sites are green field.

Unfortunately, later, should councils benefit from brown-field ‘windfall’ sites, they cannot then offset new homes on these against the targets imposed.

The most recent example is in my home town of Wallingford. We have accepted the need to build 550 homes on “Site B”. A recent planning application now seeks to build 140 homes on the site of the old Habitat warehouse site. Does this permit the council to scale back the demands upon the town? Absolutely not.

The district councils, and developers like Wates continue to use the basis of the SHMA as demands for ever more house building, without recognising the efforts made by local authorities to put forward brown-field sites.

Until councils are actively encouraged to promote brown-field building, and to offset such sites against central Government targets, brown-field sites are not an alternative, but a costly source of even more house building which the developers will always seek to avoid.

Lee Upcraft

Wantage Road

Wallingford