HATS off to the squatters occupying the Gimcrack Hotel (May 30).

If people think back at how many perfectly good buildings have been left boarded up to decay, for whatever reason by asset strippers and "holding companies", not just in York, but in every town nationwide, these young people should be praised for their highlighting such corporate vandalism.

Many times in the past, when companies have owned listed buildings and were ordered not to demolish to develop sites, they have resorted to this tactic: let the building decay to a point that it becomes unsafe and voila, there you have it, a legal reason to pull down the building.

People of York and elsewhere should support the squatters in their stand.

W Elliott,

Kinbrace Road,

Hartlepool.

Updated: 10:31 Thursday, June 05, 2003