LETTERS
From John Lewis, Mark Brady, F. E. P. S. Langton, Graham Greene, Dr Israel Shahak, McG. Carslaw, L. B. Escritt, Basil Ash- more, Sir Denis Brogan. Keith R. Simpson, Peter David Flinn, G. Kitchener, Michael Bassett
Lebensraum
Sir: Professor Fred Pennance (5 September) has certainly used Mrs Raum's cause Mare as a text for a very interesting sermon on housing that is a refreshing change from the ritual denunciations of 'wicked landlords' by Socialists and the folksy extolling of the joys of owner-occupation by Conservatives. It is also a heartening piece of intellectual honesty to hear a non-socialist writer frankly admit the anomaly of granting tax relief on mortgage interest. Conservatives who talk truculently about 'subsidising those that do not need it', when discussing council house tenants, do not usually like being reminded that George Brown's reference to 3 per cent mortgages is only true for very wealthy sur- tax payers whose tax-relief gives them an effective mortgage rate of 3 per cent. Some- how I do not think it was this that George Brown 'had in mind'!
Professor Pennance's suggested strategy of restoring a free market in housing and sub- sidising people according to need rather than specific houses, has a good deal of sup- port from thinking people in all parties while the concept of subsidising people rather than houses has almost a consensus of opinion behind it. Yet both the politicians and the so-called 'quality' press, with the honourable exception of the SPECTATOR, seem to have set their face against even a discussion of housing along these lines. There are ominous signs that Mr Peter Walker is already being bogged down in a policy of massive tinker- ing and a proliferation of complex and re- sented means tests. Is there any possibility that a big and meaningful public debate on housing policy will take place? If it does, Professor Pennance's article is a heartening opening round.
John Lewis Llanfair, 40 Davies Street, Porth, Rhondda, Glam
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