Having just written a review of The Silver Sword, which is a children’s book about running from oppressors, and having to live rough and then finally finding a home and reconnecting with parents, I was again drawn to think about homelessness; in particular how today, to be precise at 8 AM this morning as I walking to work I saw three different homeless humps in doorways in the middle of my

I know that this is not unique, indeed the incidence of rough sleepers (and within that group homelessness) has increased exponentially since the current government’s austerity policies which have impacted on everyone both directly and indirectly

This was again brought home when I read two separate articles on the BBC News site:

1 Why some Japanese pensioners want to go to jail

2 The city with no homeless on its streets

Both articles reflect on the society they are written about In Japan people of pensionable age are taking to crime so that they have somewhere warm and free to live. Having achieved pension age, they are finding that their pension is insufficent to live on, so they are forced to become “criminals”.

Whilst in ‘Finland’s capital Helsinki rough sleeping has been almost eradicated.’ due to radically thinking outside the box to provide homes, to make people feel worthwhile and whilst they are in a home helping them to come to terms with who they are, and supporting them.

The Finnish policy is being adapted by various areas of the UK, but it cannot in itself succeed unless proper funding is put in place from the national purse. And this funding needs to be sustained, just as our Health Service needs proper funding (and not the various lip service pieces which government have said about extra funding when it is not).

• 

I don’t know the answers, I just know that as a society and as individuals we need to do more, not just walk past these human being, for they are human beings, and deserve support and recognition as.