THE Princess Royal was greeted by bright sunshine and flag-waving schoolchildren when she visited West Devon on Tuesday. Princess Anne was visiting the Clinton Hall at Merton, where she spoke at an affordable village housing seminar, organised by the Rural Housing Trust and Torridge District Council. The Princess is the president of the Rural Housing Trust The seminar was designed to give parish councillors information on the role they could play in promoting affordable housing projects for local people. Clinton ward member for Torridge District Council, Phillip Collins, said: 'As lead member of affordable housing within Torridge, I specially welcome Her Royal Highness to my rural ward, among the very heart of Devon's rural communities, which are rapidly being decimated by the extreme difference between income and property prices. 'The Princess Royal's concern over affordable rural housing spotlights the desperate need to keep our communities together.' According to the National Housing Federation, average house prices across the South West are now nearly 12 times average incomes, making the region one of the most unaffordable places in the Uk to buy a home. Talking at the Charter Institute of Housing's South West conference last month in Torquay, the Princess Royal, who is president of the Rural Housing Trust, described the affordability problem in the South West as 'less of a gap and more of a chasm'. The South West is the only region in the country to suffer from higher house prices, but lower incomes than the national average. After speaking at the seminar, Princess Anne signed the Clinton Hall visitors' book to commemorate the hall's 10th anniversary year. She was presented with a posy of flowers by Chloe Folland, the youngest pupil at Clinton Primary School, who was accompanied by Tom Scantlebury, the eldest boy at the school.
