Squatting in the UK

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homelessness_in_England

in england. you seriously have nowhere near the problems with people living on the streets over there, compared to north america and elsewhere.

i find that article very hard to believe. if there are only 498, then by chance i must have walked past nearly all of them by now

As always, the devil is in the detail and bureaucracy finds ways of avoiding duties.
I'm also suspicious of those figures - I'm sure that a short stroll around Leicester Square or Soho would reveal in one evening almost that many homeless.
Reference [4] links to a Guardian article which claims the figures are being manipulated (regrettably rather fact-lite), which I'm nevertheless inclined to suspect: governments do love seeing targets 'met' and I doubt they're too fussy about the means used - so long as they're not made too public.

it's all the data i could find... if you could replace it with something more reliable we'd have something to talk about.

Yeah, I appreciate that. The trouble is finding or extracting the data as an easily digestible summary.

I've waded through 102 pages of it here http://www.broadwaylondon.org/CHAIN/CHA ... s2009.html (Profiling London's Rough Sleepers Full Report - pdf) and really only discovered that there are very many shades of "homeless". Wandering the streets is just one of them.

Interestingly, there is a hint (unreferenced) of the scale of things on the Wiki page: "There are a total of 84,900 households (which may contain more than one person) that are classified as homeless."
This: http://www.homelessforums.org/showthrea ... 7b1df&t=68 from a forum is a little dated at the start, but at least gives a different viewpoint.
The first pdf here: http://www.crisis.org.uk/publications-s ... llitem=310 (from 2011) dealing with the "hidden homeless" is pretty horrifying and very likely nearer the experience of many people.

that's fair, but no matter which way you slice the data, the estimates and headcounts are much higher in north america. there just isn't the same degree of problem in england.

our own government conservatively places the homeless (including couch-surfers) at 0.5% of the population (homeless advocates place it at 1%, other sources place it at 0.3%), and somewhere from 20,000 to 40,000 (i underestimated) literally have no home to sleep in at any given time - not even someone else's couch, and some will stay in homeless shelters (source).

we also have about 14% of the population in inadequate housing (due to price and/or overcrowding).

http://www.cprn.org/documents/49103_EN.pdf




the article below speaks of the homelessness problem also existing elsewhere, but canada has been singled out as a pretty bad place in terms of homelessness.

http://www.streetlevelconsulting.ca/hom ... _Part1.htm




in terms of social housing, we have 640,000 units, and you have 3.8 million units. (source 1), (source 2). interestinly, you seem to have far less need for homeless shelter beds, as you have .

what i am getting at is that your social programs are far better than canada's for people who do not have a place to live. you are correct that wikipedia far underestimated the problem (i think it was also referring to people who had no roof at all), but you still have much more assistance available to people in need.

i think an important question is... how many of the people why become squatters do so because they have no other options, and how many are doing it because it is a political option or a tempting option of a better home than social housing or temporary housing could offer? i think that a person should have to prove that they had no other reasonable option except to squat before the rights to the land are granted.

Hey Lulu i have been squatting in london a little while now. Sort of between places at the moment, the scene isnt as strong as i imagined it would be, or perhaps i just don't know the right people lol. They have a meeting the 2nd and 4th tuesday of every month down in elephant and castle, so i'm going to go and check that out.

I think a lot of people really get a bad idea about squatting and dont understand the ammount of vacant properties that are just sitting there being run in to the ground. There also arent a huge ammount of options for some people, some council run places can be really horrible, i remember from when i was a kid in a hostel and it was a complete mess. I missed the consultation unfortunately, i hope they dont push that legislation through.

I've squatted before in an old church, but i've moved in with family again now. To the people who are squatting, you could try sitting out a job... I hope you don't use your disorder as an excuse for being lazy

Imho, it should be illegal. The majority of squatters are drug addicts and vandalize the properties they stay in. It creates LESS houses for the population and therefore more homeless people.

Low unemployment? Are you serious?

'homelessness' can, and has, been defined as the number of people lying down on the floor when the surveyor passes through. So people who are still standing, sitting or propped up against a wall havent always been counted. I dont know what counting method your 500 figure comes from, but i agree with others that it doesnt sound credible to me.

The next reference in that wikipedia page (2001 guardian article) show some other tricks that have definately been used by the official count.

For squatting read stealing.

It should be made a criminal offence with the parasites put out on the street by force.

Well, this shows how difficult it is to get an accurate summary without having to dig deeply.

Maybe it's because we've done the social housing thing for longer? IDK.
The thing is though that social housing isn't an automatic right: there is still a tested "need" for it which only helps contribute to the number of hidden homeless. While it's possible to go on a housing list and wait, that can take years to get through and the position on the list can be bumped backwards as more needy cases arise.
It's not clear exactly what gets counted as a "unit" but it will very likely include the most basic of accommodation (a single room in a shared subsidised bed-sit, for example) which would be enough to discount someone as being listed homeless.
Another aspect is that whatever it means, that's the total number of units available and says nothing about the occupancy level. Many of those units will also be decent, self-contained apartments or houses, rented from the council simply because they're an affordable alternative to a mortgage - and so the available stock for the truly homeless is reduced further. (and since people would want to rent the best they could afford, the junk tends to get pushed to one side for the destitute)
Yes. Our safety net seems to have a finer mesh than Canada's - which surprised me as your general standard of living/life quality seems much higher than ours.
I'd take a guess that squatting is a better option than a single room in shared subsidised accommodation. I've seen some of these places...
I think the reasoning behind adverse possession is sound although it's easy to see how it becomes emotionally charged into becoming 'I had my property stolen by hippies!' shock-horror headlines. Besides, "reasonable option" means different things to different people. Given a choice between a crappy bedsit and a long-unoccupied house, I know where I'd go.
Also, proving there was no other reasonable option is impossible after 12 years occupancy and improvement of an abandoned property and in those types of cases, people deserve to be given ownership.

WELL SAID!! !! !! !! !! !!

You really should read those links above about adverse possession - it might give you a broader perspective and help to better define your view of theft.
So long as you never find yourself in difficulties, right?
There's a very narrow line between what you dismiss as a parasite and those of us who, at the moment, are better off.

Why should somebody's empty property become the living place for freeloading parasites?

If a car is left parked does it give an unwashed hippie the right to drive it off?

Would that still apply to people who improve a property, which the council "forgot" they had, over a period of 12 years? Who is the more irresponsible?
Again, read up on adverse possession.

"freeloading parasites" & "unwashed hippie".
FFS, open your eyes and do try not to reduce things to an infantile simplicity.