PROPOSALS like that to build 650 new homes on the Cranborne Road (Echo, June 9), and however many more across Dorset, are being mirrored right across the country.

With annual net migration increasing by the size of the population of Southampton, it was inevitable that in time our green belt would be called upon to help accommodate the increase in numbers.

I guess that any environmental argument will be passed over in order to give the go-ahead to such projects, and, like it or not, the simple truth is that too many people now live here.

Let’s just hope, as campaigner Susan Davies points out, that local people, especially those who are working and paying sky-high rents to private landlords, are given top priority for any affordable housing that comes on offer.

High time that the government and local councils started looking after people who are trying to look after themselves, and in the process are being punished financially for doing so.

BOB WOODLAND

Cavan Crescent, Poole