Thanks to this newspaper and to Churches Together in Ilkley for keeping us informed about the recent welfare reforms. Benefits which were no more than adequate have now been reduced below subsistence level.

With the ‘bedroom tax’, social housing tenants with a spare room now lose 14 per cent of their housing benefit (25 per cent for two rooms or more).

And some people using foodbanks are in work which is too low paid to allow them to feed their family properly.

In the Bradford area, we were told at the recent CTI meeting, there are more than seven people chasing every job.

There have always been sanctions (loss of benefit) for anyone refusing to take a job without good reason.

But the Government is now proposing further harsh sanctions on the long-term unemployed – loss of benefits, performing community work, or attending a job centre for five days a week. How are they to afford the fares?

Joan Knott, Eaton Road, Ilkley