A NATIONAL Park is under fire for planning to put a £90,000 tax on barn conversions in bid to stop property developers moving into the Welsh countryside.

Leaders of the Brecon Beacons National Park Authority are proposing a dramatic hike in the "contribution fee" - forcing developers to pay them £90,000 per barn rather than the current £30,000.

Critics accused the park authority of "social engineering" to stop the rise of barn conversions in the beautiful Welsh countryside.

Tory MP David Davies described the tax hike as being "completely ludicrous" - and called on the National Park to back down.

Property developer Mat Feakins is due to convert five derelict barns into homes on the outskirts of the market town of Abergavenny.

Mr Feakins was due to pay around £130,000 in planning fees for the five barns under current legislation but if the hike is passed tomorrow by a meeting of the park authority he would be forced to pay £480,000.

He said: "We would be happy to give the authority £130,000 for affordable housing, and we could afford to, but we cannot afford to give £480,000 from net sale proceeds of £500,000 from the five barns.

"The result is there wont be any barn conversions in the national park because we are obviously not going to give away all our wealth to the authority.

"They are basically saying that if you want to create a house you have to give its wealth over to us. I think Stalin did the same thing."

Mr Feakins, of property company Camlea, said the proposed changes were "madness" because they would "put an end to affordable housing" in the national park authority.

He warned the knock-on effect will drastically cut affordable housing for local workers and families - because the fees paid by developers are used to build low-cost housing.

If the scheme were followed by other national parks across Britain it could mean the loss of thousands of affordable homes created by the developer fees.

He said: "If you do this you are going to stop affordable housing and stop barns being converted.

"Down the road, barns will be more dilapidated and harder to convert and there will be less money for affordable housing.

"I think fundamentally as a society we need to decide do we want affordable housing or to put our heads in the sand and say because we are a national park we don't want affordable housing because we don't want to develop barns."

David Davies, the Conservative MP for Monmouth, said: “This is a completely ludicrous proposal which will be totally counter-productive if it gets passed.

“I hope members of the national park authority make the right decision and reject what will be a major blow to affordable housing if it proceeds.”

A spokeswoman for Brecon Beacons National Park said a study had shown half of developments in the area would still go ahead under the proposed price hike.

She said: “We consulted on the Supplementary Planning Guidance and following comments received we commissioned a park-wide study to give an indication of whether the amount it set as a contribution to affordable housing would be likely to discourage development.

“The study offered encouraging results showing that for just over half the case studies it tested, developments would remain viable and for the remainder the study suggests it would be possible to introduce some level of contribution.”