Help the Hungry: Homelessness reports spike in capital as fears grow for winter shelters

The number of rough sleepers spotted by communities across the last six months has risen, Francesco Loy Bell reports

Homeless people collect donated food provided by the Rhythms of Life charity near Trafalgar Square, London (Lucy Young)

The number of reports of homeless people on London’s streets has increased dramatically since last year amid calls for more funding to be earmarked to help rough sleepers in the UK ahead of a challenging winter.

Charity Homeless Link saw reports of people sleeping rough from April to June almost double year on year as the first lockdown period set in, rising to 12,134 from the 2019 figure of 6,899.

And the following three months also saw a 28 per cent increase on the previous year, with 9,271 alerts received from July to September.

The figures were obtained from the charity’s Streetlink service, through which members of the public can send an alert to local outreach or support service if they see a vulnerable person on the streets.

To help meet this increase in demand, The Independent’s Help the Hungry appeal is aiming to support as many homeless charities as possible with food deliveries this Christmas.

It comes as the Greater London Authority-backed Combined Homelessness and Information Network (Chain) warned of a 46 per cent increase in rough sleepers from April to June compared to the same period in 2019. The majority of those were men, with 36-55 being the most populated age bracket.

“Overall, the pandemic has caused homelessness to rise in London,” said Caroline Bernard, head of policy and communications at Homeless Link. “People under constant pressure to afford rent and bills on low incomes have been tipped into homelessness by job losses and relationship breakdown during lockdown.

“It will be vital that the right support is in place to support people over the winter.”

While there were 25 winter night shelter projects across the capital, providing 645 bed spaces in total in the winter of 2019/20, Homeless Link believes there will be substantially fewer spaces available this year with many shelters cancelling services due to the impact of the pandemic.

The charity has also called for more financial support to add to the government’s £10m cold weather fund, which was accompanied by £2m of support for faith and community groups to set up accommodation.

“While we welcome this funding, we would like to see a focus on more sustainable support and measures that will prevent people from becoming homeless in the first place,” said Ms Bernard.

“We are calling on the chancellor to use his spending review to invest in longer-term funding for homelessness services and to improve the welfare safety net so that it works for everyone, for example by removing the benefit cap in areas of high affordability pressures.”

This November and December we will be delivering food directly to 1,000 people a day through our partner With Compassion. Please donate here to help us do all we can to ensure no one goes hungry this Christmas.