A CRISIS summit has been held to call upon leading figures in housing, business, education and transport to find workable solutions to stem the flow of young people leaving rural North Yorkshire.

Richmondshire District Council leader John Blackie organised the event at Tennants Auctioneers, Leyburn, today (Wednesday, November 19).

Those attending heard from about 25 speakers from various fields to encourage fresh ideas to prevent the exodus of young people from Dales towns and villages.

Andrew and Emily Fagg, who have recently returned to Hawes in the Upper Dales to work on renovating an old school house into a community centre, said they love life away from London but there are not the job opportunities to allow Mr Fagg to leave his city completely.

He said: “I’m a journalist and have to keep working in London in the week.

“I grew up near Hawes so to come back with our children is fantastic, but it is very difficult to find a job here that would pay the same as my current job.”

Transport was also cited as a challenge because Mrs Fagg relies on the bus during the week, which is an infrequent service.

The couple advised encouraging entrepreneurs – starting with youngsters.

Mrs Fagg said: “Young people in the Dales, starting from children, take on a lot of responsibility and get involved with family businesses – we could encourage them to take that one step further.”

Richmondshire District Council director Callum McKeon announced the council has now put aside £30,000 to start looking into setting up its own social landlord trading company.

He said: “Despite our best efforts to deliver affordable housing the figures show it has not been working.

“Setting up our own trading company means we could act as our own social landlord – maybe by buying up empty properties or by building our own.”

The district council and Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority have pledged to work together to make it easier for development sites to be brought forward.

National park chief executive David Butterworth said: “Building more open market homes means more holiday homes or older people.

“Our new housing development supply offered 30 new sites – with half for affordable and half for local occupancy housing.

District councillor Mick Griffiths reminded the summit that the problem affected north Richmondshire too – and that despite being close to Darlington, transport and services were still poor and schools were closing.

Cllr Blackie said he hoped when the summit met again in July next year he would find good progress had been made to encourage business growth and more solutions to retaining Dales families.