Homelessness

[Gnasher]

27 minutes ago, A Red said:

You seem to just be talking about prison, I'm talking about all severe addicts and mentally ill. In these severe cases, often, any voluntary actions they are required to do don't happen and the cycle continues. 

 

If they are keeping themselves out of prison they are probably not breaking any laws other than the banned substances they are taking. If thats the situation (and no two cases are the same) the authorities probably believe its not appropriate to take any stick wielding action. In that scenario I'd think help with beating or managing the addiction would be the best route to take and they probably think the same. Otherwise you're pushing them into a corner where petty crime becomes the only option available. 

[A Red]

2 minutes ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

Like I say, there's stacks of evidence from all over the world that proves that isn't true.

Proof that voluntary assistance works better than compulsory for severe cases? If that's true, fair enough I'm wrong. I'd like to see it.

[AngryOfTuebrook]

13 minutes ago, A Red said:

Proof that voluntary assistance works better than compulsory for severe cases? If that's true, fair enough I'm wrong. I'd like to see it.

Here's an article about Housing First in Merseyside & Halton.  It's a supportive, non-judgemental approach, co-designed by the service users, with no element of compulsion or coercion.  It helps people who have been through the normal system operated by councils and haven't been helped by it.

https://www.liverpoolcityregion-ca.gov.uk/news/mayors-life-changing-housing-first-pilot-saves-taxpayer-nearly-35000-for-every-person-helped

 

Similar results are found in other places where the Housing First approach has been tried.

[A Red]

22 minutes ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

Here's an article about Housing First in Merseyside & Halton.  It's a supportive, non-judgemental approach, co-designed by the service users, with no element of compulsion or coercion.  It helps people who have been through the normal system operated by councils and haven't been helped by it.

https://www.liverpoolcityregion-ca.gov.uk/news/mayors-life-changing-housing-first-pilot-saves-taxpayer-nearly-35000-for-every-person-helped

 

Similar results are found in other places where the Housing First approach has been tried.

I like that, it seems great. However, where is the evidence that it is better than compulsory care for the severe cases that you will see in any city centre today? Housing First should most definitely be available throughout the country but there are many it cannot help back in to society.

[AngryOfTuebrook]

6 minutes ago, A Red said:

I like that, it seems great. However, where is the evidence that it is better than compulsory care for the severe cases that you will see in any city centre today? Housing First should most definitely be available throughout the country but there are many it cannot help back in to society.

One thing that Housing First does is prove that treating homeless people as humans and working with them - rather than just aiming policy initiatives at them - is far more effective and cheaper (as well as, obviously, more humane).

 

What degree of compulsion do you have in mind? Who enforces it? Who gets to decide which people are forced into your institutions, or whatever?  What evidence is there that such an approach could help people turn their lives around?

[A Red]

1 hour ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

One thing that Housing First does is prove that treating homeless people as humans and working with them - rather than just aiming policy initiatives at them - is far more effective and cheaper (as well as, obviously, more humane).

 

What degree of compulsion do you have in mind? Who enforces it? Who gets to decide which people are forced into your institutions, or whatever?  What evidence is there that such an approach could help people turn their lives around?

Housing First, I agree, if you can get people to engage is the best way of doing things, cheaper and more humane, as you say.

 

Well, there are social services, courts and prisons that can decide who needs compulsory help. I have no evidence it will work, just what I see.

 

I thought that you had stacks of evidence that my solution for severe cases doesn't work?

[AngryOfTuebrook]

1 hour ago, A Red said:

Housing First, I agree, if you can get people to engage is the best way of doing things, cheaper and more humane, as you say.

 

Well, there are social services, courts and prisons that can decide who needs compulsory help. I have no evidence it will work, just what I see.

 

I thought that you had stacks of evidence that my solution for severe cases doesn't work?

I said there are stacks of evidence: I don't have them to hand (and I have a job, so I can't go digging now).  

 

All the evidence I have seen has a recurring theme that approaches that put an emphasis on compulsion, coercion, criminalisation and punishment don't work; and if you think about it, it's obvious they won't.  The only effective approaches are those that encourage and support people to turn their own lives around; the alternative is to look "tough" to the headline writers, sweep humans off the streets temporarily, but then go round and round in a cycle of failure, that sees people in and out of temporary accommodation, prison, hospital and back to the streets.  The evidence of that is in every town and city centre in the country.

[Gnasher]

2 hours ago, A Red said:

Housing First, I agree, if you can get people to engage is the best way of doing things, cheaper and more humane, as you say.

 

Well, there are social services, courts and prisons that can decide who needs compulsory help. I have no evidence it will work, just what I see.

 

I thought that you had stacks of evidence that my solution for severe cases doesn't work?

 

The problem there is social services, courts and prisons are already overstretched. As is the mental health service. 

 

I'd rather see those with drug addictions put in lower category prisons with the emphasis more on health and trying to conform to life outside in society rather than locked up all day but again it's a question of resources. 

[Captain Willard]

I think part of the problem is that this lifestyle is seen as a problem whereas for some it’s a choice. Not a choice to be homeless but a choice not to take a minimum wage job, live in a shit town, stress about money and waste your life buying consumer crap on crefdit. . A lot of people have opted out and prefer living on the margins of society free from work, debts, stress etc. My father sold our family home (hence leaving me homeless) and lived in a camper van in a lay by for the last few years of his life. He didn’t want to be “encouraged to turn his life around” he wanted to get pissed every day by lunchtime. 

[Gnasher]

7 minutes ago, Captain Willard said:

I think part of the problem is that this lifestyle is seen as a problem whereas for some it’s a choice. Not a choice to be homeless but a choice not to take a minimum wage job, live in a shit town, stress about money and waste your life buying consumer crap on crefdit. . A lot of people have opted out and prefer living on the margins of society free from work, debts, stress etc. My father sold our family home (hence leaving me homeless) and lived in a camper van in a lay by for the last few years of his life. He didn’t want to be “encouraged to turn his life around” he wanted to get pissed every day by lunchtime. 

 

Unfortunately i think their is a lot of truth there. 

[Arniepie]

8 minutes ago, Captain Willard said:

I think part of the problem is that this lifestyle is seen as a problem whereas for some it’s a choice. Not a choice to be homeless but a choice not to take a minimum wage job, live in a shit town, stress about money and waste your life buying consumer crap on crefdit. . A lot of people have opted out and prefer living on the margins of society free from work, debts, stress etc. My father sold our family home (hence leaving me homeless) and lived in a camper van in a lay by for the last few years of his life. He didn’t want to be “encouraged to turn his life around” he wanted to get pissed every day by lunchtime. 

i dont really understand.

I get you can wanna take a flit from the pressures of modern life,quite frankly,who wouldnt?But thats not the same as "choosing" to live on the street,is it?

[Arniepie]

the bbc have not even bothered to cover this story

 

Rishi Sunak facing Tory revolt over plan to criminalise rough sleeping | The Independent

[YorkshireRed]

I’d also factor in what drives that ‘choice’.
 

My brother maintained always that it was “his life, his choice”.
 

He was mostly right of course. It was. He was empowered by those choices, in ways he wasn’t elsewhere. 
 

I think those choices were driven by; addiction, fear, anger, a lack of confidence, low self esteem, a sense that he didn’t belong, conscious/unconscious cries for help, that another direction was too difficult etc..

 

It’s too late now to know for sure, but if he could have been helped more (or perhaps differently is more accurate), then maybe he’d have made different choices. 

[Kepler-186]

A homelessness outreach group ( not PaperCup project) posted on FB couple of Saturdays ago that they provided hot food and drink to 80 people on a Saturday night. That’s just town, as there are overspill areas now. 

[AngryOfTuebrook]

3 minutes ago, Kepler-186 said:

A homelessness outreach group ( not PaperCup project) posted on FB couple of Saturdays ago that they provided hot food and drink to 80 people on a Saturday night. That’s just town, as there are overspill areas now. 

This is the fifth or sixth richest country in the world.

[A Red]

54 minutes ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

I said there are stacks of evidence: I don't have them to hand (and I have a job, so I can't go digging now).  

 

All the evidence I have seen has a recurring theme that approaches that put an emphasis on compulsion, coercion, criminalisation and punishment don't work; and if you think about it, it's obvious they won't.  The only effective approaches are those that encourage and support people to turn their own lives around; the alternative is to look "tough" to the headline writers, sweep humans off the streets temporarily, but then go round and round in a cycle of failure, that sees people in and out of temporary accommodation, prison, hospital and back to the streets.  The evidence of that is in every town and city centre in the country.

I'm not talking about temporary measures to suit headlines but a proper thought out plan that takes people with severe issues in to compulsory care until they are able to use something like housing first.

 

It looks like there is no evidence that my idea doesn't work. We're in the unsual position whereby we can't dig up Google reports to chuck at each other, just our opinions.

[Kepler-186]

7 minutes ago, AngryOfTuebrook said:

This is the fifth or sixth richest country in the world.

The last 14 years are all coming to a head. They’re not all addicts imo and there’s a lot of young women there, too. 

[Arniepie]

2 minutes ago, Kepler-186 said:

The last 14 years are all coming to a head. They’re not all addicts imo and there’s a lot of young women there, too. 

kids aswell

 

Record 139,000 children in temporary accommodation – up 7,400 in three months - Shelter England

[Captain Willard]

2 hours ago, Arniepie said:

i dont really understand.

I get you can wanna take a flit from the pressures of modern life,quite frankly,who wouldnt?But thats not the same as "choosing" to live on the street,is it?

I think a A lot of people are opting out of conventional lifestyles of a partner, job, mortgage etc and thinking fuck it I’ll live in a tent and get off my nuts all day instead. Look at the rise in tent cities in places like LA, San Francisco etc occupied in part by a lot of opioid addicts. The ‘ problem’ is that we only look at these people through the prism of conventional life styles and try to shoehorn them back into a life of sobriety, working minimum wage,  paying the rent on a flat etc A lot of well meaning posts on here are about how to rehouse these people, which is code for get them back into the conventional box. Maybe we should just leave them alone. 

[Arniepie]

5 minutes ago, Captain Willard said:

I think a A lot of people are opting out of conventional lifestyles of a partner, job, mortgage etc and thinking fuck it I’ll live in a tent and get off my nuts all day instead. Look at the rise in tent cities in places like LA, San Francisco etc occupied in part by a lot of opioid addicts. The ‘ problem’ is that we only look at these people through the prism of conventional life styles and try to shoehorn them back into a life of sobriety, working minimum wage,  paying the rent on a flat etc A lot of well meaning posts on here are about how to rehouse these people, which is code for get them back into the conventional box. Maybe we should just leave them alone. 

im not sure many people actually want to live in a tent,in sub zero temperatures,outsidethe asda,in all honestly..

[Section_31]

1 hour ago, Arniepie said:

im not sure many people actually want to live in a tent,in sub zero temperatures,outsidethe asda,in all honestly..

 

Yeah I think Willard is confusing being skint and desperate to being Grizzly Adams.

[Strontium]

4 hours ago, Arniepie said:

the bbc have not even bothered to cover this story

 

Rishi Sunak facing Tory revolt over plan to criminalise rough sleeping | The Independent

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-68713436

[Captain Willard]

3 hours ago, Section_31 said:

 

Yeah I think Willard is confusing being skint and desperate to being Grizzly Adams.

I’m not saying that. I’m saying it’s wrong to think everyone living in a tent is desperate for the alternative of  a minimum wage 35 hour week job in a Amazon warehouse, a council flat in Speke and a a DSF sofa on 5 years credit. We view this people as a ‘problem’ to be ‘solved’ through the prism of our conventional materialistic lifestyle. Maybe, just maybe the bloke in a tent outside Asda with no dead-end job to spend his life doing, no debts and no obligations is happier than you realise. 

[Bjornebye]

1 hour ago, Captain Willard said:

I’m not saying that. I’m saying it’s wrong to think everyone living in a tent is desperate for the alternative of  a minimum wage 35 hour week job in a Amazon warehouse, a council flat in Speke and a a DSF sofa on 5 years credit. We view this people as a ‘problem’ to be ‘solved’ through the prism of our conventional materialistic lifestyle. Maybe, just maybe the bloke in a tent outside Asda with no dead-end job to spend his life doing, no debts and no obligations is happier than you realise. 

If he was homeless living on a beach in Goa maybe. Outside the Asda in freezing weather surrounded by similar people  hungry, clucking and desperate…. Not so much. 

[Arniepie]

5 hours ago, Strontium said:

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-68713436

When did they post that story?