SIR – Like many others, I have often objected to housing development on former garden and greenfield sites such as that proposed between Crossflatts and Micklethwaite.

Therefore, I welcome the recent Government directive to declassify former gardens as ‘brownfield sites’ suitable for development. It is good, too, that the Government is urging councils to turn away from unpopular greenfield development.

However, some of us who take this line also accept the ‘social need’ argument. The issue is not whether to build new housing, but how many, where and in what form.

One answer is surely to redevelop derelict parts of our inner city. Inner-city Bradford is crying out for good residential development. The aim should be to make it a place fit to live and work, as well as shop.

Another answer is to build new towns, well planned and ‘hard-wired’ with viable economic activity.

A third is to return to council housing. We need to return to basics, John Prescott, not heap abuse on those who want to preserve themselves.

We don’t all live in mansions surrounded by green lawns. Ask an earlier generation of Labour politicians; council housing, new towns and urban renewal are the socialist basics. Quentin Deakin, Newark Road, Crossflatts, Bingley