I SEE that Swindon Council is continuing with its policy of relentless urban expansion in pursuit of city status.

An extra 7,500 houses must be built in the green buffer between West Swindon and Wootton Bassett at the behest of central government, we are told by councillor Kevin Small, (EA, July 11).

The objections raised at this insidious incursion into North Wiltshire were dismissed by Coun Small as scaremongering and nimbyism. What arrogance to expect the people of Wootton Bassett to remain mute at this proposal of environmental vandalism aimed at their town.

Speculative house building is a boom industry here in the south. Vast areas of countryside are being destroyed, sanctioned by Government polices which encourage the growth of one parent families, and fail to redirect investment in the North of England where the traditional industries have died out, the wages of the available jobs meagre, and you cannot give houses away.

Here, the recently appointed South West Regional Assembly (SWRA) seems purposely contrived to assist the developers in their passion for destroying the countryside, without such messy niceties as public consultation.

Nimbyism? Yes, I would agree with that definition, because it's right and proper that our town council seeks to preserve its market town heritage and rural buffer, however determined the SWRA and Swindon Council are that it should not.

STEPHEN CLARKE

Masefield, Wootton Bassett