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March 19, 2007
300,000 Homeless in London
I'd love to know where this number comes from:
With 300,000 homeless people in London entitled to vote, Mr Bird would have potentially the biggest army of helpers at his disposal.
300,000 homeless I simply don't believe. 300,000 in inadequate accommodation, not in their own home or flat I might, but if homeless is used to mean sleeping on the streets (which is I think what most would assume it does) then no. 300 perhaps, possibly even 3,000, but not that full figure.
Mr Bird has a tough manifesto message on the homeless issue. "Most people are homeless because they are addicted to drugs or alcohol, are incapable of holding down a job, or looking after themselves," he said. "They are shoved into hostels, put on state benefits and allowed to carry on killing themselves. They are ill, they need treatment, and should be taken off the streets and put in the mental health system or even prison, if necessary."
That part I do believe, that homelessness is (with rare exceptions) a function of addiction or mental illness. It also seems to show that people in hostels are being described as homeless, inflating that figure.
March 19, 2007 in Your Tax Money at Work | Permalink
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Comments
Note that this may be a figure based on people homeless in the last year, rather than homeless at a given moment. In that case, it's not entirely incredible that 300,000 people send a night on the street in london while also not having guaranteed accommodation elsewhere.
Posted by: Marcin Tustin | Mar 19, 2007 8:39:56 AM
I think they must have taken the figure from St Mungo's, who are apparently 'London's largest homelessness organisation'.
Around 20,000 people live in accommodation for the homeless in London, and this does not include people in bed and breakfasts and squats.
They also seem to suggest about 550 are actually sleeping on the streets of London at any one time.
I suppose it depends on what you think a home is; I'm not at all sure I'd regard someone in temporary hostel accommodation as having a home, as opposed to a roof over his head for the time being.
Tim adds: Roughly my point I think. Depends on your definition of "homeless".
Posted by: Not Saussure | Mar 19, 2007 9:43:40 AM
Maybe we could agree on the phrase 'no fixed abode'?
Posted by: Not Saussure | Mar 19, 2007 11:43:52 AM
"London, of course, is the global city par excellence , seen by all observers as the most international city in Europe, possibly the world. . . Europeans have moved to London in immense numbers. Numbers have increased markedly during the 1990s. London has, in the last few years, become a prime destination of European free movement, of all nationalities, from across all of Europe. One obvious Europeanising story that will not be discussed here, has been the enormous growth in migration from Eastern Europe, especially from Poland and the Balkans. Among West Europeans, who have benefitted throughout from EU freedom of movement legislation, perhaps the most striking story has been the relocation there of a new generation of talented and entrepreneurial young French people."
http://www.lboro.ac.uk/gawc/rb/rb150.html
A recent (not authoritatve) estimate given in a BBC interview almost a fortnight ago was that there are c. 500,000 French citizens resident in and around London. The trouble, apparently, is that it is so much easier to set up and run businesses here.
Posted by: Bob B | Mar 19, 2007 12:55:15 PM
Where does the number come from? Didn't you know 79.3% of statistics on the Internet are made up.
Posted by: Phil Hunt | Mar 19, 2007 5:23:11 PM
"Depends on your definition of "homeless""
I think most people's definition of 'homeless' means 'people without a home', so no, of course it's not restricted to rough sleepers. There are about 60,000 households (so a much bigger number of individuals) who are homeless and being put up in temporary accommodation by local authorities, and they are only the ones who qualify for re-housing due to being 'unintentionally' homeless and 'in priority need'. So there are many more people without a home of their own who aren't included, and the figure of 300,000 might not be that far off.
Wouldn't it have been easier to find this out rather than writing another "I have no clue what I'm talking about but THIS IS A SCANDAL!!" post? If you're too lazy or stupid to find out for yourself, maybe I should start charging you consultancy fees.
Tim adds: did you even bother to read the original post?
"300,000 in inadequate accommodation, not in their own home or flat I might, but if homeless is used to mean sleeping on the streets (which is I think what most would assume it does) then no. 300 perhaps, possibly even 3,000, but not that full figure."
FFS, get with the program will you? Reading comprhension at least?
Posted by: Jim | Mar 19, 2007 7:15:46 PM
With 300,000 homeless people in London entitled to vote
If they are genuinely homeless then how can they be registered to vote in any London constituency?
In order to vote in a constituency one must be listed on the electoral roll as resident in that constituency. In my experience local councils (the keepers of the electoral rolls) tend to be pretty strict about this: It's really not in their interest to increase the numbers of people who might vote against them. Presumably, a person of no fixed abode who claimed to be resident in, say, Vauxhall, would be committing fraud?
Posted by: xj | Mar 19, 2007 7:16:15 PM
"Where does the number come from? Didn't you know 79.3% of statistics on the Internet are made up."
The number of 500,000 came from a BBCR4 interview on 7 March but I've no better provenance and can't vouch for the number.
Several years back, John Simpson interviewed Marc Roche, the London correspondent of Le Monde, in a BBCTV prog about the differences between London and Paris. As I recall, Marc Roche quoted a figure of about 200,000 French residents living in London and the south east, some of whom commuted back to France over weekends by the Eurostar express. The only other source I've found is this, which supports the figure Marc Roche gave.
"The consulate figures cite around 40,000 French in London, but the number discussed on service provider websites is more in the order of 200,000 French in London and the South East."
http://www.lboro.ac.uk/gawc/rb/rb150.html
Posted by: Bob B | Mar 19, 2007 7:38:48 PM
More . . .
"A band played the Marseillaise, tricolores fluttered in the garlicky haze, and 51-year-old Nicolas Sarkozy, the man who would be France's next president, pleaded with the crowd for its votes. All this was happening not in France but London; home to at least 300,000 escapees from a country that Sarkozy portrays as 'exhausted'. . .
"[Sarkozy] holds Britain up as an example to be emulated: 'London has become the seventh largest French city,' he writes. 'It ceaselessly sucks in thousands of young French people - including my own daughter - who find it easier to succeed there than at home. How shameful is it that a young person wanting to get on is obliged to leave?'"
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2007/03/04/do0407.xml
"More than 300,000 French people live in Britain, with South Kensington resembling a mini-Paris."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/02/17/nlondon17.xml
"[Sarkozy] addressed a thousand French people in a hall in the City of London. In fact London has become the seventh largest French conurbation in terms of its French population (200,000 to 300,000), on a level with, say, Rouen, Lille or Perpignan. . .
"As to the flow of young French people come to work in London, many of them in financial services, M. Sarkozy gave a fascinating speech. He told his listeners that they had contributed to the dynamism of London and given it a vitality which Paris needs. He reminded them of their distinguished predecessors who had lived in London, from Voltaire to de Gaulle."
http://comment.independent.co.uk/columnists_m_z/andreas_whittam_smith/article2237666.ece
Posted by: Bob B | Mar 19, 2007 9:35:40 PM
"St Mungo's, who are apparently 'London's largest homelessness organisation'."
You can check that at www.mungos.org !
Posted by: Fran | Mar 20, 2007 12:05:33 AM
"did you even bother to read the original post?"
Yes I did, and I couldn't help noticing how you came so tragically close to not being completely bloody ignorant only to veer sharply off again with your own personal definition of homelessness. "300,000 homeless I simply don't believe." Oh wait, yes you do. Oh wait, no you don't. Do you ever think anything you don't blog about?
Tim adds: Jim, there are some things I complain bitterly about, things that truly, really, make me want to vomit at the way that language is misused to make political points. "Investment" when people mean current spending upon salaries. "Poverty" to mean inequality, not poverty. Here, "homeless" to mean "inadequately housed". Yes, I do think that those without a roof over their heads should be provided with one by society at large. We can and should afford that.
What I don't believe, and why I object to this expansion to "300,000" homeless in London is that this is the number who, generously described, are already being helped.
Anyone wants to talk to me about those who need help, sure, I'll listen. But I want my numbers pure, those who need help, not those who are already being helped.
Posted by: Jim | Mar 20, 2007 7:40:41 PM
