Three weeks ago we promised to print the facts about homelessness in this area as told at the AGM of Basics Bank by Lynn Lyons the Service Manager of In Touch. We can now reveal the true facts about the appalling problems facing some families and young people in the New Forest area as she described it. We have published a summary of Lynn's talk that evening under the heading "Pages" in the right hand column of this blog entitled "Homelessness". We hope you can spare a minute or two to read it.
1 comment:
Thank you for including the summary of Lynn Lyons' talk. I totally agree that people reliant on state benefits and services often get hemmed into a corner by contradictory welfare bureaucracy.
My local council will cheerfully promote that homelessness has declined steadily here in the past ten years; however, local branches of charities such as Emmaus and the Salvation Army will tell you that the number of rough-sleepers has doubled this year alone. These people include those who have lost their homes to the recession, those whose relationships have failed, ex-prisoners, and an increasing number of ex-services men and women. Many of those sleeping rough in Brighton and Hove are suffering from trench-foot, pneumonia and, in the harsh Sussex winters, frostbite.
I'm also aware that many homeless people are discounted from government statistics as they are seen to have a "roof" over their heads: this may mean they are sleeping long-term on floors or friends' sofas, in shelters, or in severely overcrowded, damp or insanitary buildings. In a city with a population of a quarter of a million people, 12,000 "claimants" are in DSS accommodation; many of them will have dependants.
Property prices have also rocketed here, in line with being "London-on-Sea", but the average wage has not; unemployment is higher than elsewhere in the south due to seasonal constraints. Absent landlords and owners place beautiful Victorian and Regency houses on the market and leave them to dilapidate. Last night, in the first frost of the year, there were people sleeping on the pebbled beach. It's heartbreaking.
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