THE front page headline about possible housing in Preston intrigued me.

If you look at the 1950 OS map of the area, you would see that it was all open farmland with about 100 houses in Preston and Sutton Poyntz.

Nearly every house in Preston has, therefore, been built on open land, but now a resident living near two open spaces, identified for possible future development, says this should not happen.

Does the word NIMBY come to mind?

The Neighbourhood Plan now being developed and consulted on is the Weymouth Neighbourhood Plan and Weymouth residents made it clear that they need more houses to reduce the numbers on our waiting lists and also to have houses that are affordable to their children and key workers such as nurses, care workers, teachers etc.

This is a plan for Weymouth.

I am pleased that Cllr Louie O’Leary is also very much in favour of social housing.

It is just a shame that he does not think they should be built in Preston.

It is cheaper to build affordable housing for sale or rent on greenfield sites, rather than brown field sites as costs are so much less.

The fields identified for possible development are some of the few sites suitable for building on in Weymouth, and if alternative sites in the town, not already identified by the NP steering group, are known by the residents objecting to the plan, please let the steering group know.

At the end of the very detailed development, where every open space has been identified and explored, Dorset Council, as the planning authority, take over the NP process and will publish a final consultation and hold a referendum of all the people in Weymouth.

Everyone living in Weymouth will have a say and I hope they will, as this will impact on development and service delivery in the town for the many years to come.

CLLR DAVID HARRIS

Weymouth