IN reply to N Cussons' letter ('Home for Yorkies', December 6), I am a York-born councillor, educated at city schools. After university I met my husband and married in York and gave birth to my daughter here.

It is because I am proud of being from York that I became involved in politics because I wanted to protect my city and help those who lived in it.

If N Cussons regularly reads thisnewspaper or has been to any planning meetings they would know my continued objections to the "disease" of flats we are developing.

We need decent homes with amenity areas for York residents and those who wish to move to this wonderful city. In today's society people are much more mobile and all need decent homes.

Planning, though, is a difficult area. All developers have a right to submit an application and it is up to councillors to find something wrong with it and to make sure that if an application has to be accepted then it is of the most aesthetic design.

What we do not need is the Liberal Democrats policy of building high in the city to protect those who vote for them from development.

Labour members' fear is that 20 years from now the Liberal Democrats will have left this city with the legacy of high-rise, empty, run-down flats which will need tearing down.

Coun Tracey Simpson-Laing,

Carnot Street,

York.

Updated: 10:16 Wednesday, December 17, 2003