A report on housing in the countryside claims the Government is ignoring a growing crisis faced by people living and working in rural areas.

The report from the Country Land and Business Association (CLA) says inadequate affordable housing provision and soaring house prices are leaving people in the countryside struggling to buy their own homes.

It identifies the Yorkshire Dales as a worrying example of the situation, where average prices for starter homes are more than £100,000.

The report also reveals that almost a third of homes in the upper Dales are second homes or holiday cottages, and three quarters of house sales are to people from outside the area.

CLA Yorkshire regional director Dorothy Fairburn said: "To find the workers it needs, the creamery at Hawes has to bus them in from distant towns because they cannot afford to live nearby.

"Farmers are prevented from converting redundant farm buildings into homes, often forcing away the very people on whom a thriving rural economy depends."

Plans to use private investment to help local people buy property in the Dales are being discussed.

The report, Housing the Rural Economy, is published today and will be launched in front of 120 MPs, peers and stakeholders from rural and housing organisations at the Commons on Wednesday.

Miss Fairburn said: "Large edge-of-town developments are allowed to take precedence over small, sympathetic housing schemes that allow villages to grow naturally.

"Now the Government is proposing to do away with key planning guidelines and that will only worsen the rural housing crisis, increasing the gap between demand and supply and threatening the economic base of our villages."