I'LL LEAVE readers to judge whether they would have felt insulted by your correspondent's recent comments. However I must correct the misrepresentation of Green Party policy on road building.

We do not oppose new roads as a matter of principle. What we support is good quality transport solutions that are designed to solve a particular problem and perform well on social, economic, value for money, health and environmental grounds.

Most of those who do not support the Western Bypass, including Hilton Dawson MP, the Government and Professor Whitelegg have arrived at this position following careful analysis of the arguments.

By contrast comments like "the bypass is the only way to take all the traffic out of Lancaster" from many of those supporting the bypass are an understandable gut reaction but do not stand up to closer scrutiny - which shows that a bypass would only remove around 20 per cent of vehicles from the city centre and that these would quickly be replaced due to traffic growth.

I must also point out that the fact that there is a lot of vacant industrial land with good motorway access all over the North West region is not a valid argument for not bothering with economic development in this district. What it does show is that we cannot create jobs simply by providing land and roads.

Cllr Jonathan Sear Lancaster City Division