Private wealth and public squalor

So what about all the EU residents who have been in the UK for most of their working lives who are often being told that foreigners should go home, without the person saying so realising that they are talking to a foreigner?
I hope you feel equally sorry for them, Monica.

Sorry, dj, you have lost me completely. What is the relevance of your response above to anything I have said in any of my posts?

Any one else watching Dispatches, about affordable homes?
What Theresa May has said twice about affordable homes is all lies.
Homes are being built on public land, which we owned, but the affordable ones among two hundred on one site have been dismissed altogether.
There are no homes to rent, all to buy, and not affordable for people on normal wages.

www.24housing.co.uk/news/hundreds-of-empty-private-properties-brought-back-into-use/

If Wolverhampton can do this, why not Kensington and Chelsea?

www.24housing.co.uk/news/charities-united-to-tackle-homelessness-in-london/

This is an excellent idea, too, for any large city.
Particularly as the government are not trying to sort out homelessness.

over 70,000 "affordable" homes built here in Scotland since the SNP came to power.Sadly not all are social housing but many are a mi x of council and housing association and shared ownership .The target has been revised upwards for the next five years with the aim of using our many square miles of trees to build scandinavian style homes and of course to replace these theres a plan on planting quicker growing varieties .It IS possible to build but it needs someone with committment to do it and thats whats sadly lacking in the Westminster government

Because dj as you well know K&C could not give a flying fig about anyone other than their wealthy residents which includes keeping the council tax down and shipping out the undesirables.

But lots of people on here have complained that K&C should not be able to compulsorily purchase empty homes.
Four hours later, I can't see anyone complaining about Wolverhampton doing it.

One rule for rich areas, another for poor.

I was shocked to see a Shelter advert asking for money for homeless children in the UK on TV. We are used to requests for help for children in Africa, but the idea that children in this country need help so badly is appaling.

I think I posted before that in Stoke-on-Trent, the council is making houses safe and habitable then selling them for £1. The low cost of making them safe and habitable is in the form of a loan to the new owner who can pay it back like a mortgage.

Check out this Bristol scheme:
www.1625ip.co.uk/News-Events/News/Future-Builders-move-into-their-new-Bristol-homes.aspx

Reading your OP again ww about knowing by sight the few tramps in your town, years ago, the proliferation of drug users has pushed up rough sleepers by really massive amounts.
If drug pushing and using were to vanish overnight, so would most rough sleepers and petty crime ( some violent crimes as well.)

Your prejudice is quite astounding, lemon.

Oh lemon ???????

I went to Wells again last week and looked for all the homeless in the cathedral precinct, ready with some money and a word of cheer.
However, I couldn't find any.

What lemongrove posted is not prejudiced, it is fact durhamjen that a high proportion of homelessness is caused by substance abuse which requires a great deal of help, support and treatment to overcome.
Drug addiction is also related to crime.

I'm surprised you don't know that.

It’s what the police know for a fact durhamjen and others.

Am not talking about homeless families but as I said, rough sleeping on the streets and homeless hostels.

Drugs are the modern day curse of Western countries.

I did hope that the reason I couldn't find any homeless people in the cathedral precinct was because they were being helped by the Community Outreach Service.

However, I expect the left wing ‘permanently angry brigade* will continue to blame a Conservative government
For everything under the sun.

Either that or the Church Jalima ( the much maligned Church, )the ones who do constant good, and are never thanked for it on GN.

Your prejudice is quite astounding, lemon.
Actually, yours has come shining through in that post durhamjen

In order to denigrate yet again what lemongrove has posted you ignore the truth of what she has said.

I think the churches together, along with the District Council, are doing their best to help.

Mendip District Council is committed to ending rough sleeping.

And the permanently complacent will continue to excuse every last action of the Conservative Government. And because the churches do SOME good does not mean for one minute that they don’t and haven’t done great evil - both the Anglican and RC churches have a shocking history of covering up child abuse and colluding with abusers for starters. I expect you’ll be back to defend the churches who support segregation in the southern states in a minute and do non thing but evil through their beliefs.

"If drug pushing and using were to vanish overnight, so would most rough sleepers and petty crime ( some violent crimes as well.)"

Government sttistics on drug abuse don't record homelessness, so how you can say that most rough sleepers would vanish overnight, I don't know.
If you take away drugs, they will not suddenly be given somewhere to live, will they?

JRF found that fewer than half the homeless were drug users. That's not most, is it?
If it is, my maths teaching is awry.

The Government's vision is to end rough sleeping and has called upon every local authority to adopt what is called the 'No Second Night Out' standard. In Mendip, we take this commitment very seriously and have made resources available so that:

no one new to the streets needs to spend a second night out
no one needs to make their home on the streets or in the woods
no one needs to return to sleeping rough once they have been given help to come inside
This means that services are in place so that:

new rough sleepers can be identified and helped to come inside immediately
the public can alert services if they see anyone sleeping rough so that they can be helped
rough sleepers can go to a place of safety where their needs can be assessed and they can get help
rough sleepers are able to access emergency accommodation and other services they need
rough sleepers from outside the area can be reconnected with their local community and a support network

JRF found that fewer than half the homeless were drug users
Not just drug abuse - homelessness and alcohol abuse are linked too.
Substance abuse.

And how much extra ( you know new ) money has the Government provided for this? And what about the appalling lack of services such as mental health and rehab that increase the number of rough sleepers.