A survey by a Christian community has called into question the Government's claim that ‘rough sleeping has been reduced.’

The homeless charity, The Simon Community, found 226 people sleeping rough in the UK's capital on the evening of 29th October 2004. This is a five percent increase in the number of rough sleepers since the last Simon Community survey held in April.

Following the government's announcement in September that rough sleeping had been reduced by 70 percent; the charity had expected to find fewer rough sleepers following its winter headcount.

Martin Kelly, Chair of The Simon Community, said that rough sleepers are often referred to as the most visible of homeless people. Many of them do not wish to be found and avoid contact with any of the Government or Voluntary sector outreach workers, so there are no exact figures on how many rough sleepers there are in London.

While many hostels meet the most basic needs of food and shelter, Kelly said there will always be a group of hardcore rough sleepers who avoid hostels because they have experienced theft, violence and drug-taking in some establishments and see sleeping on the streets as the preferable alternative.

The community is currently trying to raise awareness of the reasons why rough sleepers exist, and is calling for a debate with the government and other homeless service providers to re-visit what needs be done to help people whose only option is sleeping rough.

Martin Kelly said, “Anyone who thinks there is no need to sleep rough in this day and age is misguided: even at the most basic level of the problem there are not enough beds available in the hostels. We called 65 London hostels on the evening of the survey and out of a total of 3576 beds only 16 were available. We acknowledge that the government has increased the resources available to local authorities to tackle homelessness, yet the statistics show that many vulnerable people continue to fall through the gaps in current service provision.”

He concluded: “Homelessness is, first and foremost, about people – people who have become disconnected, not only from mainstream society, but from human relationships, and until the strategies to tackle homelessness are developed with this in mind there will continue to be hundreds of unreachable rough sleepers in society.”

The Simon Community was founded by Anton Wallich-Clifford in 1963. Its vision was to reach out to the homeless and rootless, to be a movement of concern and, by working as a community, to offer a radical alternative to institutional care.



Tunde Jacobs
Christian Today Correspondent