A YORK mother says she and her three children will become homeless this morning, hours after voters start going to the polls.

Kate Iveson said she had to leave her home in the Leeman Road area because the owner needed it back.

She claimed rents had now soared so high in her home city that she might be forced to uproot her family to find cheaper accommodation elsewhere in Yorkshire.

She appealed for whichever politician wins the York Central seat in today’s General Election to help her find fresh accommodation here for her and her children, Heather, 11, Ruby, eight, and Ava, six, and also to tackle the city’s housing crisis by ensuring more affordable accommodation is built.

Her pleas met with a sympathetic response. Lib Dem Nick Love spoke of her dilemma as a “real human tragedy” and pledged: “If I won, I would make it my first priority to help Kate find suitable accommodation in York.”

UKIP’s Ken Guest asked how York’s Labour-run council had not built enough affordable houses so that she would not now be in her current predicament.

Labour’s candidate Rachael Maskell said that if elected, she would want to sit down with Kate and discuss how she could support her.

Green Party candidate Jonathan Tyler said Kate’s plight was “dreadful but becoming an all too common blot on our society and challenge to our humanity.”

Tory Robert McIlveen said he would be happy to meet Kate to try to help find a solution and called for more house-building on brownfield sites.

Megan Ollerhead, of the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC), said York was one of most expensive places to live in the UK and a major council house-building programme was needed to help people like Kate.

Chris Whitwood, of Yorkshire First/A Voice For The Region, could not be reached for comment.