Help must be given to young people and public sector workers in Oxfordshire to buy their own homes or the county will continue to lose skilled workers, said trade unions.

The warning came after a study, published on May 19, revealed that nearly 90 per cent of single people and 56 per cent of couples under the age of 40 in the county could not afford to buy a home.

Oxfordshire branches of trade unions said the county had already lost many key workers -- such as nurses, police officers and teachers.

The independent Joseph Rowntree Foundation revealed that the average price of a starter home, with four to five rooms, in Oxfordshire costs £163,889 -- 4.1 times more than the average £40,231 yearly income of under-40 households. It also said that most key workers in the county earned half of the £43,100 required to buy a house costing about £135,000. Nurses were the worst off.

Trade unions said more affordable homes were needed, but that other factors -- particularly pay -- had also to be addressed.

Debbie Pearman, a Royal College of Nursing convenor at Oxford's John Radcliffe Hospital, said: "The price of houses is so high that even more money for nurses will not help them buy a house.

"We're looking forward to the new pay agenda and will be looking for a premium rate for Oxfordshire, because of the cost of living."

Mark Forder, branch secretary of the NUT in Oxfordshire, said: "The tendency is for young teachers who are trained in Oxford to continue living in student-type accommodation like bedsits."