Hope for Northumberland villagers priced out of homes
Villages, hamlets and market towns in the North East could have more homes built as planning controls are relaxed.
It is thought Prime Minister Gordon Brown is preparing to order councils to take a relaxed approach to the building of homes in areas where it is difficult for builders to gain planning permission.
The reforms, which could be announced this month, would earmark new building sites in every location where affordable housing is needed, provide incentives for farmers to sell land to developers and overrule normal planning blocks in protected areas.
The Government aim is to build three million new homes by 2020.
At present, rules prevent more than 100 homes a year being built in some parts of Northumberland.
The change in policy follows a study on the housing shortage in the UK by Liberal Democrat MP Matthew Taylor, which was published last year.
Mr Taylor criticised planning policies in the countryside which he said were turning many villages into places where only the rich can live as local people were forced out by high house prices.
He said councils should be encouraged to use current powers to grant permission to build affordable housing in villages. The homes would have covenants so they could be sold only to local workers.
A Whitehall source told a national newspaper: "We are ready to act on the thrust of Taylor's recommendations. Our view is that he is on the money. Of course, it will be controversial, but it is not something we have cooked up.
"It is something people in the countryside have been calling for."
Berwick Liberal Democrat MP Sir Alan Beith said councils should be given more support to help them build affordable homes.
He said: "More needs to be done to meet the needs of local people. Many councils would love help to build more cheap homes.
"If the newly built homes under this scheme are not affordable, then they will just end up standing empty."
More than six million people in Britain live in rural communities with populations of fewer than 3,000 and many villages in Northumberland are smaller than that.
Head of rural policy at the campaign to Protect Rural England Tom Oliver broadly supported the recommendations.
He said: "Rural planning policy has served the country well for 60 years and its intelligent evolution is crucial."
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