Readers have voiced their concerns over housing growth in Cumbria.

The Campaign to Protect Rural England has warned that planning reforms, designed to support a 340,000 new homes per year target, could cost the Conservatives at the ballot box.

An easing of the planning process was introduced under Robert Jenrick as Secretary of State for Local Government, Housing and Communities.

One of the changes to the system introduced in 2020 was a reduction of the deadline for approval or rejection of a planning application from 13 weeks to 10.

But concerns are mounting in Cumbria about the pace of housing growth with some homes sitting empty.

Commenting on Facebook, Gavin Hawkton  said: “Building tens of thousands of new houses, without the infrastructure in place, puts pressure on services right across Carlisle. That's inevitable.

“It needs to be managed.

“Personally I don't have much faith in a council that just blew £50,000 on plastic grass and a couple of seats for the town centre.”

Karen Townsend said: “So called ‘affordable housing’. What young person/couple could afford a minimum starting point of £120,00? North of the city we are left with no green spaces. Everywhere you turn there are houses being crammed onto any available land killing wildlife and public foot paths. Where are the jobs, opportunities etc? Just a disaster.”

Carol Spright wrote: “Who's going to buy all these new builds, the Council keeps hammering on about how much they're needed, agreed we do need new homes but they're needed for rental at a reasonable rate.”

Stacey Kidd posted: “The Infrastructure or even the jobs aren't here to support such a boom. Even with a Southern bypass its still not going to be enough. Our NHS services are underfunded and can't cope now, we have no dentists available on the NHS in Cumbria so what are all these new residents going to do?”

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