By Keith Morris
Norwich has almost as many homeless rough sleepers on its streets as
Manchester or
Liverpool according to the latest official government statistics, but
YMCA Norfolk has sounded a note of caution about the figures.
The official
Rough Sleepers England count, which took place earlier this summer right across the country, found that in Norwich there were eight rough sleepers on a single night, up from figures of zero in the previous two years.
Other totals were nine for Manchester and Liverpool, one in
Cambridge and four in
Birmingham.
Westminster topped the chart with a110 street count.
But YMCA Norfolk chief executive,
Tim Sweeting, said that rough sleeper counts are very difficult to do accurately: “They are a snapshot and depend on finding people who do not want to be found for safety reasons,” he said. “The Norwich figures do not necessarily mean that there is an eight-fold increase in homelessness locally.
“However, we are seeing a greater demand for our services than we can house, particularly at our new accommodation centre next to the bus station in Norwich."
The annual government Rough Sleepers figures only include people sleeping rough on the streets or other outside locations. They do not include those in hostels or other provision for the homeless.
“We are concerned by the large number of 16-24 years old who apply for our services and we are working with other agencies to increase our supply of accommodation in Norwich,” said Tim.
And the poor economic climate is not helping matters, he said: “A large number of young people are citing relationship breakdown as the reason for their application for accommodation help, this could be due in part to the current financial situation.
“Our response has been to seek to develop a 40-bed accommodation unit on Bethel Street to meet the increased demand we are experiencing.
“And we are encouraging the local community to support us financially to help make this project a reality.”
www.communities.gov.uk/publications/corporate/statistics/roughsleeping2009