Bearing in mind Brighton and Hove City Council can still control the use of land it owns through the planning system, hundreds of new jobs and homes would be created even if the council sold or leased its derelict sites to the highest bidders.

But what do we find? Seemingly, the law does not require the council to do anything at all with the sites it owns, thereby contributing to spiralling house prices, shortage of workshop accommodation and degradation of the environment it claims to be so concerned about.

-Henry Law, Queen's Gardens, Brighton