MUCH-VAUNTED Government plans to ring-fence affordable homes for people in rural communities have been criticised for not going far enough.

The Government this week said it would guarantee a supply for future generations of first-time buyers by offering properties on a part-rent, part-buy basis.

The idea is to use shared ownership to protect homes so they remain in the social sector, with the over-arching aim of preventing 13,000 rural settlements in England being lost to the private sector.

In May, the Western Morning News reported how the housing market slump has done nothing to help affordability as prices remained 13 times greater than average incomes in parts in the region.

The Countryside Alliance and the Federation of Master Builders have hit out at the Department of Communities and Local Government for missing the point.

The Countryside Alliance said more needed to be done to encourage landowners to release land for development.

The estimated 960,000 empty homes in the UK could be brought back to use if VAT was cut to 5 per cent on all repair, maintenance and home improvements.

This would both help to protect the countryside and help to meet the need for social housing in rural areas, it said.

So-called exception sites, land in small villages not allocated for development by local authorities, should be extended for small-scale housing schemes.

James Legge, head of housing of the Countryside Alliance, said: "While these announcements are a step in the right direction, a broader range of measures are needed to enable rural communities to develop the affordable homes which they so desperately need.

"The present and future Governments must deliver long-term and realistic solutions to meet the demand for affordable rural housing. This is essential if local communities are to meet their affordable housing needs."

The Federation of Master Builders said "protected" areas failed to address the supply of new affordable rural homes, the root cause of the rural housing crisis.

It said large-scale migration to rural areas, which had increased the rural population by 800,000 in 10 years, meant rural house prices were substantially above the national average.

It also called for the planning system to be more responsive to local housing needs because its "current inflexibility" had been "a serious factor in denying many people in the countryside the option to have a home of their own".

Brian Berry, director of external affairs, said: "The simple fact is that we don't have enough affordable homes in the countryside to meet current demand and the collapse in the house building industry is only making matters worse.

"The Government's decision to ensure that new shared ownership properties will have to remain in shared ownership for future buyers is a welcome boost but the real need is to build more affordable rural homes to enable local people to stay in the communities where they live and work."

The scheme means buyers will either be restricted to purchasing 80 per cent of shared ownership properties in parts of rural England, or will have to sell them back to providers if they acquire a 100 per cent stake.