Cambridge’s housing crisis stretches across the income scale.

 Amelia Gentleman and photographer Antonio Olmos 

Voices and votes

The Guardian has sent six reporters to constituencies across the country to each spend a month listening to people in the run-up to the general election. We want to hear what life is like, understand the important issues and report what this election will mean to different voters. We encourage you to contribute to, guide and help shape our reporting – and to follow our progress as we publish weekly from each of our six constituencies.

Cambridge’s housing crisis stretches across the income scale. The Conservative candidate here says he can’t afford to live in the city; the Green party candidate is worried about the cost of his rented flat; the new editor of the Cambridge News lives outside the centre, where prices are less insane.

In the past fortnight I’ve heard from a teacher who quit her job and moved 150 miles away to Shropshire because she couldn’t afford the rent, an NHS auditor who often spends two hours getting into work in the morning because her salary doesn’t allow her to live anywhere near the city’s hospital, a care worker living with her parents in Suffolk (at 30) and doing a long daily commute to do vital work with adolescents with eating disorders, and a university administrator unhappily stuck in cramped houseshares.

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