What an idiotic concept is Oliver Letwin’s proposal for ever more large scale house-building in Dorset: Thomas Hardy is sure turning in his grave.

Mr Letwin must be aware that Dorset is virtually devoid of dual-carriageways so how are all these extra residents going to travel from A to B? 

When he travels back to Dorset from Westminster each week does he never have to join the queues of snarled-up traffic at Ringwood, then Wimborne, then the slow procession behind some delivery truck through Dorset? 

Is this Mr Letwin’s future vision for Dorset? Today (July 23) there are reports of an accident southbound on the M3; this will mean delay and frustration for many thousands of travellers, it always does and it happens with increasing regularity because of overcrowding and the pressure is equally severe on schools, hospitals and other public services.

Why would we want to turn Dorset from being a green and pleasant land which displays the English countryside at its very finest into a series of huge building sites, typified by Poundbury? 

This is a project doubly diabolical because the developer has inherited the land for free and on trust. Hasn’t Mr Letwin caught on yet? 

The reason there is a housing shortage is because of overpopulation and this problem will not be solved while we are content to allow half a million extra citizens to enter the Nation each year. 

To accommodate this amount of new people it is necessary to build 10 towns the size of Dorchester in Britain every year.

Why would any sensible MP want to burden his electorate in this way and at the same time so damage the infrastructure of a beautiful county?

Mr Letwin’s time would be much better spent enthusiastically promoting Brexit so that we can all get back to some degree of normality and to a voting system that makes our legislature fully accountable. 

He will then be made entirely aware what the electorate think of his plans, not only on housing, but on his enthusiasm for Brexit.

A C EMERY
Weymouth