The charity Crisis warns of increased levels of debt and homelessness as new figures reveal areas that will be hardest hit by planned cuts to housing benefit.

Catholic Archbishop of Westminster Vincent Nichols has become the patron of homelessness charity The Passage, a post originally held by his predecessor, Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor.

Amnesty International has called on the Italian authorities to halt a plan that could involve the forced eviction of thousands of Roma people from their homes.

Insisting that “there is enough for all”, three church organisations have challenged their supporters to share, exchange and reuse, to combat the economic downturn. They say there is an alternative to a system built on greed.