UNLIKE John Crick (HAS, Feb 14) I applaud what Ken Loach had to say at the BAFTAs simply because it is true.

The benefits system under this Government is guilty of callous treatment – there are many like Daniel Blake who have worked and contributed all their lives, only to find when they need support that it is refused.

Doctors are overruled by anonymous decision makers on the basis of assessments which are of such poor quality that they are very often overturned on appeal and people have benefits stopped for the most trivial of reasons.

Mr Crick describes Ken Loach’s language as shameful – what is truly shameful is that in a country like ours hundreds of thousands of people are having to resort to food banks to survive.

Ken Loach is right to highlight these injustices, and I hope he will continue to do so.

Michael Broadbent, Bishop Auckland

POLITICIANS who’ve never wanted, worked or taken responsibility for anything in their life expect people to survive on zero-hour contracts and the minimum wage etc.

This forces even those in work to depend on food banks and tax credits, etc.

The failures of successive governments helped create a housing shortage, leaving people unable to downsize to a one or two bedroomed flat and having to pay rates or the bedroom tax on a home they can’t afford or move out of.

Imposed benefit sanctions mean that from one month to three years people receive no benefits.

If they can’t obtain work during that period then with no money coming in they can’t buy food, pay their bills or their rent.

If J Crick doesn’t regard the consequences of the Benefit reforms as an act of “callous brutality”, there are millions of fellow Britons now reliant on food banks, made homeless or known someone driven to suicide who from their own experiences will disagree with him.

CT Riley, Spennymoor.