When is a policy not a policy? Answer: when it has failed because then it was never really a policy, just a target.

This exercise in semantics is the latest excuse from Coun Tracey Simpson-Laing for the disastrous affordable housing policies which have all but destroyed private house-building in this city.

It is like saying there isn’t really a 70mph speed limit on our motorways. That’s just a desirable objective so people will hopefully slow down to somewhere near it. Try telling that to the judge.

The viability tests she speaks of are totally unrealistic. If housing projects can be allowed with a lower contribution subject to an artificial viability test, then there was no need to alter the 50 per cent policy, was there? The viability test would set the contribution figure. The decision to reduce the policy figure from 50 per cent to 25/35 per cent says it all.

The theoretical possibility of negotiating down an obligation never did work. Hundreds of homes were classified as affordable under the council’s flawed formula, but in five years only five dwellings were built and handed over – and this was before the economic crisis.

John Jones, Sand Hutton Manor, York.