Big Issue founder says Government needs to ‘get off its rear’

Lord Bird said people face slipping into poverty and homelessness.

Lord Bird (Ian West/PA) (PA Archive)

The threat of homelessness for many families is worse than it has ever been, the Big Issue founder has said.

Lord Bird said the Government needs to “get off its rear” and move away from short-term solutions.

He said there are a million people, if not more, who face slipping into poverty and homelessness due to not being able to pay their rent or mortgage.

“And that is the most worrying thing that I have seen certainly since the days of the early launch of the Big Issue,” he told Times Radio.

Asked if he thinks the threat of homelessness for many families is worse than it has ever been, Lord Bird said: “Yes, I mean, historically, we do not have a situation like this, and I don’t want to sound like an old git, but maybe living in Cambridge has made me think of history, but I think you’d have to go back to the Highland Clearances, or even the enclosures, that drove thousands and thousands of people into the cities.

“Absolutely wretched. Nowhere to stay and getting jobs at the mills.

“I don’t think there has ever been a period in history like that, maybe at the end of the Napoleonic Wars where people were drifting into the streets with no support.

“After the First World War there was a lot of people that were displaced. After the Second World War there was support, but we have not had a situation like this. It’s historical.

“And I think this Government has got to get off its rear and stop talking about doing short-term things.”