Under fire, business chief who told charity for homeless to leave town

A BUSINESS leader has been accused of ‘social cleansing’ after she called on a homeless charity to leave her town, saying it had attracted more rough sleepers to the area.

Susie Colley, head of Torquay Chamber of Commerce, said an increase in begging was affecting trade with some shopkeepers now too scared to open. She said rough sleepers were ‘intimidating shoppers’ and Torquay would be ‘doomed’ if the council and police did not act.

She called on Humanity Torbay, a charity that runs a drop-in centre in the seaside town, to relocate. In an email to local organisations and MPs she claimed there had been a ‘10 per cent increase’ in those looking for food and accommodation as well as begging and rough sleeping since the group set up its ‘soup kitchen’.

In her letter, Mrs Colley described the centre as ‘very laudable’ but said it was so successful it was attracting too many rough sleepers. She added: ‘To put it bluntly, unless something radical is done regarding the rough sleepers and begging, which is ongoing and is affecting these stores and impacting on their sales, they will close and that basically will be the end of Torquay.’

She was supported by Tim Godfrey of the local Business Forum, who called for a solution that deals with ‘both the needs of the genuinely homeless and the needs of the business community’.

But Humanity Torbay founder Ellie Waugh likened Mrs Colley’s comments to ‘social cleansing’. She said: ‘We are not a soup kitchen, we are a registered charity for vulnerable and homeless people. We are extremely concerned that we are seeing a massive influx of homeless. We have not encouraged people to sleep rough.’