SIR - The editorial 'County must face reality on housing', June 23 puts the cart before the horse.

We do not have a housing shortage. We have far too many people, indeed almost ten million people living in our country today were born elsewhere in the world.

I've no doubt the children of local people need homes but walk from Lowesmoor to the Shambles, through our new shopping centre, between 11am and noon, and you will undoubtedly see and hear many people speaking foreign languages. That is our problem.

Our population is unsustainable. We have to face the fact there are too many of us for our environment to support or sustain, indeed Cambridge University estimates by 2030 we shall be short of almost 8,000 square miles of farmland. That's eight times the size of the Lake District.

You can harp on as much as you like about the housing shortage, all you are doing is avoiding reality. Sooner or later you are going to be forced by circumstance to face up to the truth that we have become a grossly overpopulated country. The longer you refuse to accept that truth the more catastrophic the eventual solution is going to be. Moreover by continually harping on about a 'housing shortage' you allow our politicians to continue to duck and dodge the problems unsustainable immigration is spawning.

N TAYLOR Worcester