IT is “outrageous” to suggest older people should sell up for smaller homes to make way for the younger generation, the Echo has been told.

A think tank called the Intergenerational Foundation (IF) said older people are hanging on to large family homes for longer than they need them.

About 25million of the 60million bedrooms in British homes are unoccupied, according to the IF, while young people face a housing shortage and escalating rents in many areas.

However Peter Munns, chief executive of the Bournemouth-based charity for the elderly, Help and Care, said: “It’s kind of outrageous that older people are being singled out.

“We should be talking about all sectors of society who have spare capacity in their homes.”

The IF suggested stamp duty could be scrapped for over 60s who are downsizing or even withdrawing some universal benefits to those living in houses worth more than £500,000.

Bournemouth older people’s champion Cllr Chris Mayne said: “It certainly could be an incentive to cut stamp duty but there’s nothing stopping just one person moving in.

“It’s an interesting concept and I can understand the situation with council houses but it’s not something that you can enforce.”

The Bournemouth 2001 census records that two thirds of its households - 50,845 - were occupied by one or two people. Of those, 74 per cent had four or more bedrooms, suggesting far more than half of the town’s bedrooms were sitting empty.

In the town centre, none of the older people questioned by the Echo backed the suggestion they should downsize.

James Munro, 79, from Canford Cliffs in Poole, said a stamp duty reduction would be an incentive to move.

But he added: “We have got two-and-a-half bedrooms and we use them when family and friends come to stay. Even if we moved it would be to a three-bed. I think they need to build more houses.”

A pensioner from Bournemouth who declined to give her name said: “It’s so wrong. People who have saved hard don’t want to be forced out.”