Homelessness: Temporary Accommodation

Lord Bird Excerpts

Tuesday 19th December 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bird (CB)]

Can Her Majesty’s Government look at the human rights abuse that allows people to sleep on the streets? Maybe we need to revisit the old legislation whereby we do not allow people to sleep on the streets but provide places for them off the streets, rather than putting them in prison as we used to. We have an emergency on our hands; we need to remove people from the streets and put them in a place of safety. That should be at the top of the Minister’s list.

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord very much indeed for his contribution in this area—not just in the House but very much outside it. I take his comments seriously. As he rightly says, prevention is at the heart of this complex issue. It is clearly not a simple issue: this country has faced this problem over a period of time. As I say, it is very much at the centre of the Government’s thinking and all agencies contribute to it. We have trailblazer areas looking at this, and Crisis and Shelter, for example, are on our advisory committee. Rough sleeping is something that the Government are very much committed to ending.