The lack of affordable housing around Helston and the Lizard Peninsula is to be raised by MP Andrew George today (Wednesday, February 28) when he meets with housing minister Yvette Cooper this lunchtime.

Mr George is meeting the cabinet minister in a bid to persuade her to change planning laws and control the amount of second homes in the area.

It follows a survey he conducted in which one Helston estate agent revealed that over the previous 12 months, 65 per cent of the houses he had sold were to become second homes and he had not sold a single home to first time buyers.

Since then house prices have continued to increase, with two thirds of all properties available on the market for sale over £200,000.

Mr George is concerned that local residents have been priced out the market and are no longer able to buy a property in the area that they grew up in.

He said: "The market appears to operate almost as if local people have no right to continue living in their own communities. This is not about the politics of envy, but the politics of justice. Doing nothing is no longer an option."

He believed that local authorities should now be given the authority to discourage purchases of second homes by imposing an additional tax and restrict numbers by requiring renewable planning consents.

"I believe that the housing minister has begun to show that she is listening. That is why I would prefer it if it were possible to work with her and the government to find a solution to this problem, rather than to be standing outside her department in perpetual campaign mode," added Mr George.