‘No one was bitter, it was just another day’
WHAT IT’S LIKE TO WAKE UP HOMELESS ON CHRISTMAS DAY
CURLED up in tatty sleeping bags, slumped in doorways, all with nowhere to go.
For the last three years the M.E.N. has published a series of photos showing people waking up on the streets of our city on Christmas Day.
Christmas morning 2019 was no different.
There were people of all ages, men and women, many of whom had ended up homeless after difficult childhoods.
Our photographer Joel Goodman walked through Piccadilly Gardens and Spring Gardens, down Market Street and Portland Street and saw around 30 people living rough.
There were many more across the city.
Josh, 22, is from Wigan but has had nowhere to go since becoming homeless at the age of 16 along with his younger brother who was just 13.
He is very protective of his brother, who did not want to be named.
“All I want is a door and a key. The last time I opened a door of my own I was 16,” he said.
James, 40, has been sleeping rough for the last six months after getting out of prison. He described a horrendous childhood that has had long-lasting effects.
“All I want is a room,” he said.
In a doorway outside Urban Outfitters on Market Street there was John Wrench, from Wigan.
He has slept on the streets since the age of 14, another homeless person without a childhood.
We also met Shaun Davies, 29, from Cheshire, who was dismayed because overnight someone had stolen the £9 he had collected in a cup.
One man, Mark, 44, had travelled from Stoke where he is homeless to see family for Christmas. He didn’t want them to know his plight.
There are very few passers-by in the city centre on Christmas Day and it is eerily quiet.
A handful of volunteers were walking around giving out drinks and chatting to the homeless.
One of those determined to do good was George Harvey, 26, who lives in the city centre and has been crowdfunding to raise money for supplies.
He raised £700 and was busy handing out clothes, biscuits, crisps and orange juice.
“I just wanted to give something back” he said.
Dave Robinson, 60, from Chorlton, has spent every Christmas morning for the last ten years giving out tea, coffee, mince pies and chocolate on the city centre streets.
“I have a brilliant life. I have friends, family and enough money. When you walk around Piccadilly Gardens and see people with nothing it could be any of us if we didn’t have the start in life that we have had. It could be any of us.”
Dave, who is semi-retired and writing a book said: “We are a fantastically wealthy society. I don’t understand why we can’t help these people by giving them the support they need however complex. They need doctors, dentists, counselling and help with benefits and help finding work. It’s a solvable problem. What does it say about us as a society that we don’t solve it.”
Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham’s Bed for the Night scheme has gone some way to reduce the number of people without a place to sleep but it has not managed to catch everyone.
One homeless person we spoke to said they hadn’t heard of it, another said that they found it impossible to sleep in a dormitory after past abuse.
Our photographer Joel said: “It is so sad. These people do genuinely want a roof. There is no one to beg from today. They literally have nowhere to go.
“There are people who have been homeless for ten years. They have complicated circumstances, they are hard to help. My overwhelming impression is that one size doesn’t fit all and a one-size approach doesn’t work.
“The sad thing is no one I spoke to was bitter. They accepted this was their lot. It was just another day.”