Call for rural housing investment

More than 100,000 young people will leave the English countryside during the coming three years due to a "chronic shortage" of affordable housing, it has warned.

An estimated 103,000 people aged between 24 and 35 are expected to migrate from villages and market towns to urban areas by 2012, according to the National Housing Federation.

The group warned there was a real danger that traditional village life would die out within a generation because of the exodus, which is leading to schools, shops and transport services closing.

It said the migration was being fuelled by a chronic shortage of affordable housing in rural areas, with young people finding themselves priced out of villages due to an influx of wealthy commuters, second homeowners and people retiring to the countryside.

David Orr, chief executive of the Federation, said: "There's a real danger that traditional village life will die out within a generation unless we can build more affordable homes for young people and stop what is fast becoming a mass exodus to cheaper, urban areas.

"Rural England desperately needs young adults to support and contribute to their communities, but high house prices and a chronic shortage of affordable housing are threatening to turn our villages into family-free zones."

Rural house prices tend to be well above the national average, while rural incomes are well below average, and this affordability gap has widened during the past five years.

Waiting lists for affordable housing have soared by 40% in rural areas during the past five years to 700,000 people.

The Federation said the number of young people living in rural areas had been declining at an alarming rate for more than a decade, with 341,000 people aged between 24 and 35 leaving the English countryside between 1997 and 2007, the equivalent of 22% of the age group.

The problem is even worse in some areas, with 38% of young people leaving East Dorset, where the average house costs 16 times the average income, and West Somerset during the same period, while 37% left South Shropshire.

The group, which represents housing associations in England, estimates that around 100,000 new affordable homes need to be built in rural areas during the next 10 years to meet demand.

It is calling on local authorities in rural areas to draw up action plans to address the housing needs of their communities.