VILLAGE shops and pubs across the rural north Northumberland will be forced to close down due to a lack of affordable housing according to the National Housing Federation.
The federation has warned that a 'chronic shortage' of affordable housing is plunging traditional village life into terminal decline.
Milfield lost its Post Office in the latest round of closures, and the village school is also set to close.
B
renda Brodie, who runs the village shop, and formerly the Post Office, said: "We are all very uncertain about the future of the shop.
"Everything is very much up in the air, but we are going to keep going and see what happens. We have added a number of new lines such as homemade goods to try and attract new custom.
"I am optimistic about the future and take each day as it comes.
"The big concern is the winter months, without the day trippers and holiday makers," she added.
Coun Dougie Watkin, from Norham, is a vocal campaigner for affordable housing.
He told the Advertiser: "It is essential that we get young people to stay in the area, and through the planning system the primary aim is to get as much affordable housing as possible, but that is a long term thing.
"Hopefully we can work with Berwick Borough Housing and other providers to get more affordable housing, but the key is that it has to be genuinely affordable for people in this area.
"It really is something I'd like to see a bigger push on."
Coun Watkin added that in Norham, following the Post Office closure in the village shop earlier this year, the replacement mobile service is taking business away from the shop.
He said: "If we'd not had a Post Office before, we'd have thought the mobile service was wonderful, and credit to the Post Office for providing it, but it does take away from the viability of the shop."
Nationally, up to 650 country pubs and 400 village shops will close over the next 12 months according to a coalition of leading campaign groups, including the National Housing Federation, the British Beer and Pub Association (BBPA) and the Rural Shops Alliance (RSA).
They are calling for urgent action to be taken to halt the demise of the countryside.
Across Britain, the BBPA estimates 54 country pubs could close a month if current trends continue, while the RSA forecasts 33 village shops a month could go out of business.
The RSA warned the scale of the closures was "unprecedented," and said around 1200 shops had already closed in rural areas over the last two years, while the BBPA said over 600 pubs shut last year in the British countryside and warned there was little sign the dramatic decline was slowing down.
Monica Burns, National Housing Federation north east regional manager said: "Many of the region's villages are in real danger of losing their unique identity.
"Pubs and shops are often the heart of these rural communities.
"Unless we build more affordable homes for local people, they will continue to be priced out of rural areas and the shops and pubs they support will vanish with them."
The federation said the mass closure of shops and pubs reflected a declining demand for services in villages where local families - their core customer base - had been priced out of the area by an influx of wealthy commuters and second home owners.
Rural house prices tend to be well above the national average, while rural incomes are well below the national average.
This affordability gap has widened rather than narrowed over the last five years.
The federation is calling on local authorities in rural areas to draw up action plans to address the housing needs of their communities.
A shortage of suitable land, a failure to assess local housing needs and local opposition often means the affordable homes which are desperately needed are never built.
