After the Bhasvic playing fields fiasco, Russell Education Trust (RET), which manages King’s C of E School, is again asking Brighton and Hove City Council to allow it to build their 1,200 place free school on a large part of the King Alfred Leisure Centre site.

This would prevent the development of an international-standard swimming pool, ice rink and leisure facility on the site, which would both provide enhanced sports facilities and contribute to our future prosperity as a national centre for sports.

As the May 24 public meeting convened by Mike Weatherley MP confirmed, this would need a joint city/private funding initiative for redeveloping the whole site.

A school on the King Alfred site would also lack outdoor sports facilities. Does RET also have within its sights subsequent encroachment on the public spaces of Hove Lawns, including the bowling greens, tennis courts and pitch-and-putt course?

Edward Clay, Berriedale Avenue, Hove