Thanks to the geographically discriminatory admissions policy practiced by Brighton and Hove City Council, the likelihood of getting our daughters and sons into any of the over-subscribed secondary schools in Brighton (or indeed Lewes) is nothing but a sick joke.

Unless they have a sibling already attending one of these schools, children living in the area bounded by Elm Grove across to Whitehawk down to Brighton Marina along the seafront to the Old Steine and then back to Elm Grove don't stand a chance of getting a place.

So it concerns me to hear that parents who live in this blighted part of south-east Brighton not only intend putting down one of those over-subscribed schools as their first preference but also intend doing the same thing for their second and third preference.

As I am sure the schools admissions department of the council will confirm, if you put down as your three preferences schools which are regularly over-subscribed and you don't get your first preference, basically you've busted your flush.

When schools are over-subscribed it is school to home distance which determines who gets a place and who does not.

The over-subscribed schools you have listed may be your nearest schools but other parents live nearer to them than you do, so they get the places and you do not. It is as simple as that.

If you are unsuccessful in getting a place at any of your preferred schools, the council will allocate your child at the nearest under-subscribed school to where you live, even if this school is further away than any of your preferred schools.

The reality for those of us living in this secondary school Bermuda Triangle is that we can only express preference for those schools which are presently under-subscribed.

Gamble with a first-preference over-subscribed school if you must but please think very carefully about which schools you list as your second and third preferences.

-Lynne Nicholls, Brighton