So Brighton and Hove City Council and Worthing Borough Council have sold Shoreham Airport for about 40 per cent of its estimated value and, they assure the public, strict rules would prevent the land being used for housing.

What strict rules? The agreement allows the property company, Erinaceous, to consider other options for the site if it could show the airport was no longer commercially viable by 2041.

Also, it will not be allowed to use the land for housing without the Adur District Council's agreement and changes to the local plan.

So, like anyone else wanting to build, all they will have to do is apply for planning permission from Adur District Council.

The Brighton Marina Act of Parliament granted permission for a marina with buildings no higher than the nearest cliffs.

A minor clause was inserted which, the public was assured, was to permit Brighton's Council to allow minute variations to this major consideration - to allow for the odd lamp post which might slightly exceed cliff height.

Brighton and Hove City Council has interpreted this as allowing it to grant permission for a 40-storey skyscraper plus a massive building complex almost entirely above cliff height, while the number of marina berths has been reduced even though the foreshore on which the marina is built was virtually given to the originating company specifically to provide a marina.

If the intentions of an Act of Parliament can be so easily and massively altered, how much easier it will be to ignore any supposed conditions of this sale.

This contract's drafting should be subject to a public enquiry.

-Oscar Thompsett, Brighton