SO THE Con-Dem coalition Government is now set on ridding the country of council housing.

The millionaires in the Cabinet think this form of housing is too cheap. The proposal seems to be reducing secure accommodation to five or ten-year contracts, and to forcibly downsize where accommodation is deemed to be too big for the occupants.

Also, it appears applicants will be means-tested and a large number rejected on the grounds of income. This forces those who will never be able to get on to the property ladder into the insecurity and inflated rents of the private sector. No doubt this will benefit the many private landlords who are Conservative supporters.

With an ever-increasing population, this will prove disastrous. Unemployment is set to increase further and within York due to the ludicrous affordable housing regulations, private-sector house building is now at a standstill and will remain so.

The disastrous policy of discounted sales of public housing has already devastated rural areas and will, together with this new idea, create homelessness on an unimagined scale.

No doubt Cabinet members will not be too worried about their own housing security or about the size of the properties within which they live.

C Urquhart, Millfield Road, York.