Sir – The letter from Julie Edgington (September 25) in regard to mine, dated August 21, merits a response. I have three points to make.

Our understanding is that the Local Plan favouring Carterton East was not put to the full council but published after a vote at a West Oxfordshire District Council cabinet meeting, which was not unanimous.

I observed in my letter that housing need should go alongside jobs. RAF personnel from Lyneham, and their civilian support have long since moved to Brize.

With cuts in Ministry of Defence expenditure it is very unlikely that the RAF base could provide jobs for many who might move into new housing.

A quick look at your paper and on the web shows few jobs are available – no vacancies advertised in Carterton in the current edition of the Witney Gazette, five with one online agency, two with another and nine on the RAF base. One other agency claims 42 vacancies on their database.

To underline the lack of jobs, on page 7 of your paper you report on an initiative for the jobless in Carterton.

The Witney Gazette does, however, have details of 21 houses for sale in Carterton, so my point is that we do not need any housing in either east or west Carterton.

The new Strategic Housing Market Assessment for Oxfordshire may well suggest the need for more rather than less new housing in Oxfordshire.

If the district council is determined to ignore the issues addressed in my original letter and build near Carterton, Julie makes the very valid point that Carterton East is constrained in its size, while Carterton West has ample space to expand.

Dr Phil Holmes, Carterton Road, Brize Norton