Brits face three centuries' wait to find a council house!

London, Aug. 1 (ANI): British nationals hoping to find a council house need to wait for nearly three hundred years due to chronic shortage of affordable housing, a shocking survey has revealed.

The problem, which arose because few new homes are being built in rural areas, could get worse as a record 750,000 people are on council house waiting lists, The Sun reports.

Worst hit is East Dorset where families face a 292-year wait. About 2,241 people are on the waiting list - but with just 23 affordable homes built in the last three years, the demand hugely outstrips supply, the National Housing Federation (NHF) survey found.

Next worst is East Yorkshire with a 280-year wait. And third is Newark and Sherwood, Notts, with a 183-year wait.

Other areas also have a meagre stock of cheap homes. Last year just four such properties were built in the Cotswold district, five in Alnwick in Northumberland and six in West Somerset.

NHF CEO David Orr fears the trend is killing off traditional village life as people are priced out.

"We cannot go on ignoring this problem and hope it will somehow get better," the paper quoted him, as saying.

Homeless charity, Shelter, described the statistics as "heartbreaking." (ANI)