Writing about secondary-school admissions in Brighton, S Smith suggested Councillor McCaffery was self-interested (February 9) and Paul Grivell (February 11) suggested Pat Hawkes had no principles. Both letters disingenuously failed to address the issues.

Brighton and Hove City Council's children, families and schools committee (CFS) voted 8-2 to retain the current distance-based criteria in 2007. It also voted 10-0 to keep looking at modelling alternatives and to consult more widely.

To accuse some councillors of self-interest and lacking principles is a case of being unhappy with a democratic decision.

Pat Hawkes, CFS chair and a Labour councillor (Hollingbury and Stanmer), can't be accused of lacking principles. Making a difficult decision after a review of the facts shows the opposite.

Secondary schools aren't evenly distributed so some children have no local school. As the most popular schools, Dorothy Stringer and Blatchington Mill are over-subscribed and some children don't always get their first choice.

They are then allocated places at other schools, such as Patcham and Hove Park. Eventually these get filled and, based on the 2005 figures, 74 children ended up with unwanted places at Falmer.

So how should the places at the popular schools be allocated? Using the current distance criteria, children closest to the schools get in and those further away don't.

Is it fairer kids from Hanover or Regency wards should replace kids from Preston Park, Withdean or Stanford? No, but that is all the original proposals achieved - moving disastissfied parents from one part of the city to another.

Most children living more than two miles away from school will use a car or bus, even to get to their nearest school. Does it make sense to give the place of a child who walks to a school to one who has to use transport? No, as it will only increase cross-city car journeys.

Mr Grivell says some children have many choices while others have none but this is spurious. Each child can only occupy one place at one school. The fact some children who end up at Stringer could have gone to Varndean makes no difference to those who can't get into either.

The public consultation was not a referendum.

It discredited the nodal system that only moved dissatisfied parents around. The working group has not said "no" to change until 2008, when hopefully a system which improves the current one can be found.

-Mark Bannister, Brighton