How I treasure my memories of the homeless people I worked with from the time in the 1980s when I was, in turn, a hostel, outreach and resettlement worker. Such warm recollections of a procession of individuals who invariably treated me with courtesy and kindness, dispensing practical advice to a raw kid who was, at times, out of his depth. Though in circumstances where people were frequently struggling with alcohol or drug dependency, debilitating mental health problems and extreme living conditions there was also an overlay of threat, sporadic violence and moments of stomach-churning fear. At 22, working in a homeless young people’s hostel near Kings Cross station in London there was plenty of opportunity to taste fear on a regular basis. We were a young team, the hostel was expected to take the most chaotic young people from the West End and it was 1981, a time when, at least in my experience, risk assessments had still to be invented. Hostel shifts felt like a form of Russia
There is a shopping mall in London where over 50 people sleep rough every night. It represents the biggest congregation of rough sleepers in the capital. At 7.30 in the morning when I was there recently it was clearing rapidly of rough sleepers who were being hastened along by the amiable security staff. Around 20 people were still gathering together their belongings. There was an astonishing range of nationalities - English, Indian, Eritrean, Portuguese, Italian, Lithuanian and Romanian. Some were heading off to work shifts in restaurants and on building sites. One man proudly flourished his CSCS card, that highly prized proof that the owner has the required training and qualifications to work in the construction industry. He would be returning that night to the relative comfort of the mall. Relative, that is, to the other places where outreach workers meet rough sleepers in 21st century London – on buses, in public toilets, in hospital A&E departments, along canal towpath