‘We had to take turns staying awake to keep safe’ (Picture: EPA)
As temperatures plummet and December skies unleash torrents across the UK, an estimated 40,000 more people will find themselves homeless this Christmas compared with last year.
The UK will see a 14% increase in people spending the festive season on the streets or staying in hostels, B&Bs and other temporary accommodation, according to homeless charity Shelter.
And an estimated 36,000 young people will face homelessness this year – 24,400 this winter alone.
Earlier this year, then Home Secretary Suella Braverman described homelessness as a ‘lifestyle choice’, but for many young people who have found themselves sleeping rough, the truth is much more complicated than that.
A combination of personal problems, abuse, addiction and relationship breakdown, alongside economical factors; frozen housing benefit rates, lack of social housing, the pandemic and the cost of living crisis, have led to thousands without a roof over their heads.
Some 167,000 people are expected to spend Christmas without a home (Picture: EPA)
Jasmine, 30 from North Shields, tells Metro.co.uk that she was just weeks away from graduating when she found herself homeless in March after a disagreement with a family member.
In a moving video, she talks about the loneliness and desperation of finding herself with nowhere safe to go. After out-staying her welcome on friends’ sofas, Jasmine found herself working in the university library until it closed at 8pm, before heading to the university car park where she would sleep in her car.
She remembers: ‘I was in the back of my car under blankets and I just felt so cold, really alone and really depressed. As much as I wanted to sleep I couldn’t. My anxiety was at an all time high.
‘I would like awake so worried and having suicidal thoughts. It was my third year and I should have been trying to figure out what I was going to do for employment and graduation. But I couldn’t concentrate on that. It was really hard.’
Jasmine kept all her clothes in two piles in the boot – clean and dirty and relied on showers at the university’s sports centre. She brushed her teeth with bottled water and a glass in her car and didn’t eat a hot meal for days. She lived off crisps and sandwiches while she worked out what to do.
‘At uni, I just had to pretend that everything was okay,’ she remembers. ‘I used to really struggle to open up. I felt like I just had to put on a facade so people didn’t judge me.’
After eventually confiding in a tutor, Jasmine begged to give up her course.
‘I knew I couldn’t put on a facade any longer – I couldn’t pretend that I was doing OK,’ she says. ‘I was ashamed to admit that I had nowhere to go, nowhere to live. I never expected to end up homeless.’
Jasmine contacted her local EveryYouth Charity’s service Nightstop who gave her a bed five days after she moved into her car. She graduated, eventually found somewhere to live and has just signed a tenancy agreement with the local council for a one bedroom property with her own front door and is setting up a freelance business.
She says: ‘I feel so much better. Safe and secure. Just my own little space.’
Brittany, 24, would take spice to try keep warm during freezing nights (Picture: Brittany Jackson)
Meanwhile, 24-year old Brittany Jackson, from Sheffield, experienced abuse and domestic violence as a child and lived in a chaotic environment that culminated in her going off the rails.
She was moved between her mum’s, her dad’s and her grandad’s homes which saw her get into trouble at school. Her behaviour alienated her from family, and Brittany found herself on the streets as a teenager, moving between hostels and sleeping rough with her partner at the time.
‘We had to take turns staying awake to keep safe from the abuse of people out on the street. It was a difficult and scary time,’ remembers Brittany. ‘We mostly spent our time walking around Sheffield town centre. Sometimes we were lucky enough to get a bed at a friend’s house.
‘Sleeping on the streets makes you feel disgusting. I wouldn’t shower for two or three days, and I was constantly trying to make sure I looked okay and that I didn’t look homeless. You feel very ashamed, like scum; like I didn’t really deserve to have a good life. And people see you’re vulnerable and take advantage of you. I was quite easy to manipulate at that age.’
Brittany started smoking spice to keep her warm during the cold nights and then she was convinced by her dealer to sell it, a decision which she deeply regrets. ‘You would get between £40 and £60 a day, which is a lot of money when you’re on the streets,’ she explains. ‘I live with unbelievable guilt about that. It left lasting scars. I have to sit with the knowledge that I brought other people into drugs. I’m clean now, and they are not. I wish I had never done it.
‘But when you are young and vulnerable and [dealers] are offering the support that the council aren’t able to, you take it and you run with it.’
Brittany is now able to give back and help others struggling(Picture: Brittany Jackson)
After eight months sleeping rough – an experience that saw her spat on by drunks – Brittany discovered local EveryYouth charity, Roundabout, and was given a place in an emergency hostel.
The charity helped her repair her relationship with her family, she was given her own tenancy by the council and now Brittany works as a peer educator, keeping other young people off the streets.
She adds: ‘Instead of judging homeless people, I would ask people to ask themselves how they got there. Instead of judging them, I would say to be kind and look at the whole picture.’
Charity EveryYouth provides funding to help young people overcome financial barriers to long-term accommodation or secure employment and work with employers to help young people in the jobs market.
‘This Christmas, thousands of young people are facing a perfect storm,’ explains the charity’s CEO Nick Connolly. ‘The cost-of-living crisis isn’t going anywhere and is putting families under more and more pressure. Benefits to support young people haven’t kept up with inflation and the housing market has become simply unaffordable.
‘All of these factors can paint a bleak picture for any young person looking to take their first steps to independence; but for young people facing homelessness, the world can feel hopeless and isolating.’
Angel tells Metro.co.uk how he found himself homeless last year after a relationship break down. After sofa surfing, staying with relatives, and spending a few nights at a hostel he slept rough in Staines for eight months.
Angel would wear multiple jumpers and sneak into abandoned buildings to stay warm
I discovered an abandoned office block, so I snuck under the fence and set up a room,’ he recalls. ‘I bought candles and a sleeping bag and all the essentials and I found an old sofa to sleep on. It had no cushions, but it was something. I kept as warm as I could by wearing two jumpers, a jacket, two pairs of trousers. But I kept thinking to myself – things can always get worse.’
Angel was on Universal Credit at the time, but it wasn’t enough to pay for rent or a hotel. He relied on his local food bank and carried around an enormous rucksack filled with the donations he’d been given. He sought help from Farm Place, an EveryYouth project in Surrey, has since found stable accommodation and is now working as a teaching assistant and support worker.
He adds: ‘I count myself very lucky. Some people have lost everything and aren’t able to get that help.’
It’s a similar feeling for 28-year-old Jade Blade, who spent years caught up in a cycle of addiction, homelessness and abusive relationships. She ended up in a women’s refuge five years ago after her chaotic lifestyle saw her rotating between friends’ homes and the streets, following a man who got her addicted to crack and heroin and who stole her money.
‘It was a heartbreaking time. There were days when I just cried and cried because I didn’t know whether I was coming and going,’ she tells Metro.co.uk. ‘I would dream of a safe place I could call my own. Especially at Christmas; I just wanted a proper place that I could decorate.
‘It was so hard but you have to keep moving every day. You walk the streets to keep warm and because of the addiction. I had to find shops to shoplift from to fund my habit. I knew I wanted to sort my life out and that I couldn’t keep living this life. I used to walk around looking for fag ends to smoke. That’s not a life.’
And after years on the streets, Jade is proud to be well, working and drug free (Pictures: Jade Blade)
Jade used to walk into her local supermarket, pocket a meal deal and try to walk out.
‘The staff would stop you and take it back. It’s heartbreaking because they don’t realise how hungry you feel and what you’ve been through,’ she remembers. ‘I understood it was wrong, but when you’re that hungry. your whole body feels it. I’m eight and a half stone now; I was five and a half then. I wasn’t eating enough. I was smoking. I wasn’t sleeping properly. I didn’t feel in my own body at all.’
Jade would sleep in the bin shoot rooms of blocks of flats or in public playgrounds. Eventually, she fell gravely ill, and was hospitalised with pneumonia and suffering from bronchitis and liver damage.
‘I looked a mess. I was so pale, so gaunt, my face was sunken, I had dark circles under my eyes and my hair was a state as I hadn’t seen a hairdresser in years – or the dentist. I just didn’t look after myself.’
Desperately thin and struggling with a £200 a day heroin habit, Jade was on the brink of death. But her opportunity came when her partner was put in prison. She split up with him, sought help from EveryYouth charity, Roundabout’s Rapid Rehousing Team and was given a roof over her head. And after years on the streets, Jade is now well, working and drug free.
‘I consider myself lucky to be alive. I’m committed to not falling down that hole again,’ she insists. ‘I’m in a good relationship now and I’m working. Life on the streets is really hard. You might look down on the homeless, but they are just normal people that have had bad experiences.’
To help, you can buy festive gifts for young people including pyjamas, winter bedding or a £10 Christmas dinner.
READ MORE: The people left homeless and pushed to the brink by Universal Credit
READ MORE: How to help a homeless person during freezing conditions
READ MORE: Record number of children facing homelessness at Christmas
Homelessness can be lethal
The average age of death for people experiencing homelessness is 45 for men and 43 for women, according to charity Crisis. People sleeping on the street are almost 17 times more likely to have been victims of violence and homeless people are over nine times more likely to take their own life than the general population.
People become homeless for lots of different reasons. There are social causes of homelessness, such as a lack of affordable housing, poverty and unemployment; and life events which push people into homelessness.
Some are forced into homelessness when they leave prison, care or the army and many women experiencing homelessness have escaped a violent or abusive
‘You walk the streets to keep warm and because of the addiction. I had to find shops to shoplift from to fund my habit.’
