Cartoon by John Sadler: www.johnsadlerillustration.com

• THERE has always been a sizeable element of people who look the other way when they see people in trouble, (What is our role in life if we don’t support each other? Comment, April 11).

The difference these days, it seems to me, is that there is a powerful lobby – including regrettably many politicians – which, far from looking away, gets a perverse pleasure out of going over and making those people’s troubles 10 times worse.

It’s called kicking people when they’re down. Or austerity, for short.

EF WILSON
Camden Town, NW1