IT concerns me when I read about adjustments to housing benefit and the commitment of past and present governments to a programme of convergence between social housing rents and those of the private sector.

These policy makers have lost the plot when it comes to social housing. This was designed for ordinary people and it often provides those on low income with the security of somewhere to live.

In the past great pride was taken with the majority of properties. Now it seems as if the country is ashamed of the term social housing.

So why tinker with a proven but now sadly flawed system in a weak state? I think it is an elite prejudice that believes ordinary struggling families will have to find ten years of £20 per month increases to try and match the obscene property speculator rents in the private sector.

Social rent is calculated for a reason and a specific need, and until someone comes along and explains what any government has done with the five per cent of capital receipts from the sale of council houses, then I would question why tenants should have to pick up the bill for future investment.

Kendal Wilson, Wharfebank Terrace, Tadcaster.