I CANNOT let Coun Simpson-Laing’s comments regarding her “campaigning” over amenity space go unchallenged (Fighting for space, January 15).

For it was she and her Labour cohort Coun David Horton who voted through the application that allowed three large detached houses to be built on the edge of the conservation area in Copmanthorpe.

These three-storey houses have virtually no garden space to speak of at the rear and just a concrete apron at the front for car parking. I would defy anyone to visit this development and say that these houses, essentially family homes, have adequate gardens or amenity space.

So if Coun Simpson-Laing is such an ardent campaigner for amenity space and one who is prepared to take developers, large and small, to task for failing to provide adequate amenity space why did she vote for this cramped development in Copmanthorpe to go ahead?

Gardens are the amenity space we need for families with young children. Gardens that are too small are a waste of precious space as the ‘amenity’ space they provide is of no practical use whatsoever.

We need more family homes with proper-sized gardens that can be used; what we do not need is more high density housing developments where the houses are packed so closely together that they can have, at best, only token, pocket handkerchief-sized gardens.

David Smith, Church Street, Copmanthorpe.