Fears are growing in Government that Bermuda's high divorce rate is contributing towards the housing shortage.

According to the Registry of the Supreme Court and Bermuda Statistics, one in two marriages in Bermuda will end in divorce ? one of the highest rates in the world.

Since January this year 240 divorces have been filed in Supreme Court.

In the House of Assembly recently, Minister of Works and Engineering and Housing, Ashfield DeVent, said social challenges such as the divorce rate and children wanting to leave the nest early for the purpose of getting a car put further pressure on housing demand.

Mr. DeVent told the Ministry of Transport to review their policy which restricted vehicles to one per household in an attempt to get families to stay together longer and alleviate the housing crisis.

This concern was echoed in Senate by Senator Bob Richards who also attributed the housing problem to the high divorce rate and single parent families.

He added that with half of marriages ending in divorce, keeping families together could go a long way towards solving housing shortages.

This sentiment, however, is not reflected by various organisations on the Island.

Many feel Bermuda's brutal housing market is what is putting strain on families.

The Program Director of The Family Centre, Peter Carey, said the organisation was working with about 100 families in crisis every year.

He said he wasn't sure how ministers could make the connection between divorce and single parent families contributing towards the housing crisis as there were so many different economic variables to take into account.

Mr. Carey described Bermuda as an unusual society with huge class differences and the gap between the so called super-rich and the medium to low-income families was enormous.

The super rich, he said had companies that paid their rents, while the medium to low-income families had to pay their own way and in Bermuda, with its exorbitantly high rents, it was not easy for anyone.

"It's these pressures that drive families into crisis."

Althea Iris, president of Single Parents in Action, agreed.

Mrs. Iris is a mother of three boys and has moved five times in the past 13 years.

She said it was unfair of government to criticise single-parent families when it was such a big part of Bermudian culture.

"There hasn't been a sudden increase in single-parent families, there have always been single parent families and there always will be."

She said what needed to change was Government calling single-parent families "dysfunctional" and blaming them for problems in housing.

Mrs. Iris said the housing shortage was nothing new, finding affordable housing was the problem.

"Most of our members, including myself, have always had a problem finding affordable housing, especially when you have a big family like mine."

She added that single-parent families were perceived as being backwards or poor and that wasn't true. "We do what we can and no matter who you are, or how rich or poor you are, you will always want the best for your family."