Published: 13 July, 2012

• I WAS astonished to read the Forum article by the leader of Islington Lib Dems Terry Stacy (House-building cannot gobble up open spaces, June 29).

Was it not the Lib Dems who sold off part of Barnard Park for a private housing development and put the proceeds in the council’s pension pot?

Was it not the Lib Dem council under Terry’s leadership that proposed to build 270 housing units on the green space around the Sobell Centre, which itself was to have been demolished?

Was it not the Lib Dems who initiated the plan now reaching completion to rebuild Ashmount School on Metropolitan Open Land and redevelop its original site as housing?

He now acknowledges “just how controversial these plans are with residents”, thus slyly trying to shift the blame to the present Labour council which, while regrettably persisting with the Ashmount scheme, did at least cancel those plans for the Sobell.

Not so long ago Cllr Stacy also admitted that the Barnard Park sale had been “a mistake”, but this seeing of the light is sadly coming all too late.

To build housing without attendant amenities, including open space, is to build slums – and there are recent examples one could point to.

JAMES DUNNETT
James Dunnett Architects
Barnsbury Road, N1