2,000 homeless on the streets of London

 

More than 2,000 people have been found sleeping rough in London since Christmas, figures revealed today.

This was up eight per cent on the same period a year earlier and included 1,030 people who took to the streets for the first time.

Experts described the situation as a “disgrace” and said it showed the impact of the Government’s housing benefit cuts and the lack of affordable homes in the capital.The homelessness charity Crisis said the figures came on the back of three years of annual rises. Last year it emerged that the number of street sleepers had more than doubled since Boris Johnson became Mayor in 2008.

Mr Johnson originally pledged to eliminate rough sleeping by 2012. His efforts were focused on a “No second night out” campaign, which directed resources to creating a “safety net” to offer immediate help to people spotted on the streets. Leslie Morphy, chief executive of Crisis, said: “It is nothing short of a disgrace that, in one of the world’s most prosperous cities, so many Londoners continue to be left out in the cold.”

Almost half of the rough sleepers were UK citizens.

A spokeswoman for the Mayor said: “Any person without a home is one too many, but with huge investment from City Hall the vast majority of new rough sleepers now spend just one night on the street.”

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