The deputy prime minister proposes four high-density housing developments around Milton Keynes, Cambridge, Ashford and the "East Thames Gateway", because young people and key workers in the south east are being priced out of their communities.

Tories have accused the government of appearing to want to "bulldoze the north and concrete the south".

Thousands of acres of greenfield sites will be smothered, says the Council for the Protection of Rural England (CPRE) and instead, people should be coaxed away from living and working in the south-east.

Mr Prescott pledged to focus development on "brownfield" land but this could only be done by "cramming people into the highest densities we ever developed in the 18th century" says a university professor of planning.

What do you think the answer is? Would you move out of the south east? What could tempt you away? Are John Prescott's designs for housing sensible and progressive?

This Talking Point was suggested by Carl, UK:
"Is the proposed development of new homes in the south-east going to be of benefit to people, or is the government pumping money into an already overcrowded and overpriced small corner of the UK?"

If you have any suggestions for Talking Points,

This debate is now closed. Read a selection of your comments below.

Your reaction

Empty homes should attract punitive taxes Derek Amory, London, UK

There are thousands of empty homes that have been that way for years. Owners can make money by doing nothing while we have house price inflation. Empty homes should attract punitive taxes. Secondly there is no good reason why government departments need to be in Whitehall, except for the convenience of senior overpaid mandarins.
Derek Amory, London, UK

Sounds like a return to the "New Towns" scenario that created Milton Keynes and the other 26 New Towns created by successive governments. The intent was to decentralise away from the large urban conurbations of London, Birmingham etc. Initially they worked very well, then the jobs dry up and a lot of people then found themselves stranded - home wise - and forced to commute back to the cities they came from - hence the burden on the roads and railways. It has become a vicious circle.
Jim W, Lincs, England

Up here in the North West there must be 200,000 houses sitting empty in the current urban area. For less money they could be renovated and sold to public sector workers (at a favourable rate) to improve regeneration of these areas. By decentralising some government departments the government could set an example to the private sector, improve inner city economic problems and leave the declining countryside as it is!
Chris Brown, UK

Well I used to live in a suburb, but it has now become part of the city and all the fields have been developed on and traffic has increased. All the new houses are crammed in on top of one another. I see plenty of old or condemned empty buildings about so why can't these be developed first (and be sold at more affordable prices) rather than ruin what green space we have? My boyfriend and I want to move to Italy in a few years time because we can't see things in this country improving.
Louisa, East Anglia, UK

I think that businesses should be encouraged to locate elsewhere in the UK, besides the South East. I have moved down to the South from the North for work, but would have rather stayed where I was. Perhaps businesses could have some kind of tax break for locating outside of the South? The government needs to ensure that people don't have to move South to find work.
Claire, UK

Now that we live in the electronic communications era, there is no real reason why big business has to be in the South East Stephen Briggs, UK

For once the Tories are right! Building more houses just exacerbates the problem in the South East. The houses still won't be affordable to public sector workers, so who is going to teach the extra children or nurse the sick? The whole social infrastructure in London is on the verge of collapse.
We need to force businesses and people to relocate to other parts of the country to create a better balance in our economy. Now that we live in the electronic communications era, there is no real reason why big business has to be in the South East. As with so many other policies, it's about time that the London tail stopped wagging the UK dog.
Stephen Briggs, UK

There is no affordable housing in London. I live in Greenwich the average wage is �22k and you need �110k to get on the first rung on the property ladder-you do the maths it doesn't work. Central Government should be moved to the Midlands, civil service jobs and contracts would follow. They did the same thing in Germany after reunification. There is no more room in the South East!
Patrick, London, England

Whenever I travel round London I see huge, empty buildings. Often architecturally magnificent, their councils have left them neglected and boarded up. Until every one of these has been converted into stunning starter flats for nurses, teachers and policemen etc. planners should not be seeking to make the commuter's life even more bleak and soulless. Most singles and young couples would prefer to live nearer to workplaces, and would benefit their environments; bringing life and prosperity back to inner cities.
Clare, UK

Absolute rubbish. There are hundreds of thousands of empty properties throughout the UK. Building new houses is about spin and scams. I live in Lancaster and the green belt is being threatened by housing development, and a bypass, a farmer has gone bust so he is selling the land, which incidentally has wintering buzzards and large flocks of redwing and fieldfare, all will go with the land. What is annoying is the fact that at the last count, even in our small city, there were over 2500 empty properties all suitable for living accommodation. As usual with profit making it is about short term gain for a minority of people at the expense of the quality of life for the rest of us. Can someone please inform two jags Prescott that there are some of us who could do a far better job than he can!
Zed, UK

It is equally important that we preserve what little we have left of our green areas Anna Mitchell, England

It's important to ensure affordable housing for everyone but it is equally important that we preserve what little we have left of our green areas. Much more could be done in terms of developing brown field sites, and encouraging people to live away from the south east (better public transport would enable people to commute more easily for one thing).
Anna Mitchell, England

Call me selfish, but I'm not going to be too pleased if all these new houses push down the value of my own property.
Richard, UK

Too many people own more than one property. With share prices falling and bank interest rates so low you get a better return from investing in property to either sell on or rent out. This is driving up profits and needs resolving - I suggest charging a "second house tax". Instead the Blairs (or Cherie at least) are quite happy to add to the problem by also buying to rent.
Martin Daine, UK

John Prescott's claim to be able to build more affordable housing in SE England while increasing Green Belt acreage in SE is not achievable. He is so desperate to build in Green Belt that he overrides not only the Local Planning Authorities but even his own Departmental Planning Inspectors in order to grant development permission on long established Green Belt. The only way he can increase Green Belt acreage is to reclassify other open space as Green Belt. This will not be the first time he has misled the British public.
Graham Bate, England

If the government and industry would get their heads around the development of broadband technology, a greater number of people could work at the other end of the country in relation to their central office. This would ease work related congestion in the SE, both transport and housing.
John, UK/USA

The M20 is approaching gridlock Simon Mallett, UK

With regard to Ashford, first of all where will they work? The M20 is approaching gridlock and is Ashford's ONLY main road out. The current new building is on flood plains and the existing services such as rail, shops and schools are effectively swamped already!
Simon Mallett, UK

Personally I don't care anymore. As soon as my fianc�e is a qualified nurse next year we are leaving the UK for Canada. Unaffordable housing has driven us (I am an MSc and have a PhD, my partner will be a nurse) away. How many will follow?
John, UK

All this development seems to be coming to the north and south east of London. What about to the west of London? Berkshire and North Hampshire are a nightmare to live in at the moment! All the houses built here seem to be one extreme or the other. 5 bed detached properties at �400,000, or 1 bed flats at �150,000. When they are actually built, they get snapped up by people with outside interests. What we need are affordable 2 bed houses, for example, for young couples to move into, and not have to move out of immediately as soon as a kiddie comes along.
Anthony, Basingstoke

There are about 500,000 empty houses in England. Put jobs where the houses are, not the other way round, and everyone would be happy - except perhaps for the politicians who think civilisation ends outside the M25...
Julian Hayward, UK

Most of the people against the growth of suburbia are either people who live there now (the NIMBY brigade) or so-called activists who, without a real job, are looking for some socialist nirvana where we all live in little boxes and take the train everyday: compliant little citizens taking comfort in the fact that we're living our boring little lives for the greater good. Not!

Well, here's the news: Most people aim to own a detached single family dwelling, with one or two cars, a little bit of garden (with a robin flicking through the shrubbery), within walking distance or a short drive to all the conveniences, good schools, roads and other infrastructure, and surrounded by people like them. These people work hard and deserve to have these goals ... after all, they pay 90% of the taxes.
Mark M. Newdick, US/UK

Not every bit of scrubland or nondescript field is sacred! Jon Cooper, UK

The time has come to face up to the fact that not every bit of scrubland or nondescript field is sacred! We need more houses where the jobs are, which is in the south east. 89% of the country is countryside, this will fall to only 88% even if ALL the housing plans were enacted. Would anyone notice, apart from NIMBYs?
Jon Cooper, UK

Why build in the south east? There are many places which are close to major motorways and have direct high speed train services to London. Shouldn't we be focusing on developing Doncaster, Chesterfield, Stafford, Port Talbot or Warrington rather than Milton Keynes etc? Government departments should set the example and move out, let's see the MOD headquarters in Carlisle!
Victor, UK

The CPRE's argument appears to be "Keep all these nasty outsiders away from our lovely villages and make them live in tenements on the site of former asbestos factories." If the jobs are there in the south east, why shouldn't people who work there have nice houses? I expect the objectors are worried that an extra supply of decent houses will affect the values of their �1m farmhouses in Surrey.
Helen, Britain

The emphasis needs to be taken away from the capital - the south clearly hasn't the transport system to cope with more congestion. Prices are purely fuelled by demand - spread the demand round the rest of the country. I'm currently looking at emigrating to Canada in search of a better quality of life.
Dave, Berkshire

The area I live in is losing more and more open space Steve T, South East England

This just gets worse and worse. Already it is nigh on impossible to go anywhere without suffering endless queues of traffic. The area I live in is losing more and more open space, and this will do nothing to help the situation. Perhaps it is time that the government looked at redeveloping the major cities and adopting the high rise. Surely spreading upwards has got to be better than outwards!!
Steve T, South East England

Housing is like shopping centres. They say that we do not have enough available and build more but we still have the ones just down the road which are empty. In just the few roads it takes for me to get to work there are several houses which have been on the market for some time, but they still plan to build a new estate nearby.
Sarah, UK

How about more reliable and much, much cheaper public transport? If we had that, people could live further out of London yet still work there.
Aris, UK

John Prescott's plans are total lunacy Keith, UK

As someone how has lived all my life in Essex I am sick of successive governments ruining my county with never ending building. With current technology there is no need for businesses to be in the SE of England bringing with them a never ending desire for more houses. We are now full up and no further building should be allowed in the SE of any kind. Businesses should be ordered to go elsewhere in the country before we lose all our greenbelt land to concrete. John Prescott's plans are total lunacy.
Keith, UK

Mr Prescott should visit some of the multi-storey housing projects in Paris. These are substantial well built and designed estates with plenty of underground car parks. He must stop developers building poor quality high density housing where rooms are too small and traffic flow to London is increased.
JCL, London

These days it seems that there are no more "open spaces" in my local area. Get a small plot of land and it's immediately sold for housing development. Even land previously set aside for allotments is being sold off by local councils to generate cash.
Andrew L, UK