Homeless charities slam 'open season' on street people
Police and vigilantes are seeking to ‘other’ people on the street, says chief executive of Crisis
Charities have expressed concern about an “open season” on homeless people following tough language by police and political figures and vigilante threats to “fake homeless”.
Those working on the frontline suggested that rough sleepers and others might be facing a cold climate in a broader sense even as a major operation swung into action to shelter homeless people amid heavy snow and falling temperatures.
At least one homeless man has died during the freezing weather: he was found dead on Tuesday in his tent in the snow in Retford, Nottinghamshire.
Police in Cambridgeshire claimed last week that every single “homeless” beggar in Ely was making “substantial amounts of money” and that the city had no genuine rough sleepers.
There was also an outcry over a campaign launched by a businessman in Torquay, Devon, in which volunteers photographed people and put up posters warning “fake homeless” people that they would be “cross-referenced”.
Separately, the leader of Windsor council – who sparked uproar over his call for rough sleepers to be cleared from the town before the royal wedding in May – said on Twitter on Thursday that there would be a major investment next month in community wardens to focus on antisocial behaviour across the borough.
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