Two disabled brothers -- who have a life threatening condition -- are being forced to sleep in a cramped living room with their parents.

Twelve-year-old Mohammed Ditta sleeps in a hospital bed with his father Mohammed Saleem next to him on a settee.

Six-year-old Tahir Saleem must sleep with his mum, Shanaz, on the carpet at their home in Victoria Avenue, Keighley.

And it could be another 11 months before Bradford Council can assess their suitability for help to adapt their new home in the Spring Gardens area of Keighley.

Until then they must stay in their small terrace house with their other three children, aged 16, nine and seven.

Bradford Council officials have told the family it will be that long before they get a grant to adapt the new house. It needs a downstairs bathroom and wheelchair access.

"The two children need help 24-7. They need help to turn at night. They can do nothing for themselves and are completely dependent on us, " said Mr Saleem.

"We live in two small rooms downstairs. The lounge is like a hospital ward with a hospital bed and a hoist and a settee. I sleep on the settee and my wife on the floor with our other son -- there isn't enough room even for a mattress."

A downstairs bathroom was built six years ago, but now it is too small for his growing sons.

They both suffer from life-threatening Canavan's spongiform encephalopathy, a degenerative disease. They have breathing problems, suffer fits and have difficulty swallowing.

Their parents have already lost two other children to the disability, a one-year-old boy and six-year-old girl in the early 1990s.

Mr Saleem added: "We have never had a life. It is very difficult to put into words how we feel.

"But the children don't deserve to live like this -- their life expectancy is short and they deserve a better quality of life," he said.

The family's problems have been highlighted by Airedale Hospital's paediatric department and the council's own social services department, which says their help is limited until the family move to somewhere which has facilities to meet the Health and Safety Act.

District councillor Lynne Joyce, who is demanding a review of the prioritising system, said: "This family has to live like this for this period when the children might not have that life expectancy.

"There is something very wrong because we are talking about not just the quality of life for these very seriously disabled boys, but the rest of the family."

Jim Pressley, of Keighley MP Ann Cryer's office, said the MP had received a number of similar complaints over recent years. He said: "It must be possible for the council to devise a scheme whereby priority of need, not just order of application, is a factor in deciding when adaptations are carried out."

A Bradford Council spokesman said an assessment had been carried out on the family's needs and a disabled facilities grant was being awaited from the Home Improvement Service.

"They are waiting to move into a new house, which means adaptations to the property will have to be assessed," he said. "Unfortunately, this means they are on a waiting list with other families in similar circumstances."

Officers understood the distress and recognised there was a need to reduce the waiting list, and they were piloting new ways of working to improve the service, he added.