Birmingham will end up with its own Cardboard City if a ‘catastrophic’ £10 million funding cut goes ahead, the city has been warned.
And concerned charity chiefs warn that lives will be at risk.
There has been a 43 per cent rise in homelessness across the UK and the number of rough sleepers on city centre streets has soared in the last year.
It was just a few weeks ago that rough sleeper Chiriac Ionut was found dead outside a city car park after the coldest night of the year.
But now Birmingham City Council is proposing removing £5.2 million this year – rising to £10 million next year – from its Supporting People budget.
This is the fund which pays charities and housing associations to provide services for some of the city’s most vulnerable people, including rough sleepers, the disabled, mental health patients, ex-offenders and victims of domestic violence.
The fund has helped 13,500 people remain independent, deal with addictions, learn new skills and overcome other obstacles which place them at risk of homelessness or crisis.
But, faced with a 40 per cent cut, the charities predict that many will be plunged into a downward spiral of desperation, crime, addiction and desperation.
This, they say, would place additional burdens on emergency health and police services.
It could also prove a false economy for the council, which is already spending almost £4 million a year putting up homeless families in hotels and bed and breakfast accommodation.
Homelessness charity St Basil’s is warning that the number of rough sleepers is likely to increase, leading to the real prospect of a cardboard city developing in the city centre.
Cardboard City was the vast area where an army of homeless people lived in boxes near Waterloo Station in London during the 1980s and 90s.
Other UK cities have recently seen them spring up – and recently the Ark, a self-built shelter in Manchester was cleared and its inhabitants evicted .
Meanwhile, the annual rough sleeper count in Birmingham city centre has seen numbers rise from less than ten in 2012 to more than 50 a night by the end of 2016.
A spokeswoman for the charity campaign said: “Birmingham City Council is faced with an almost impossible task in trying to achieve a balanced budget in the face of massive central government cuts and sharply rising social need. We are working to help the council find ways to mitigate the risk to affected service users, but there will be devastating impacts.
“We must support and speak out for the most vulnerable in society because these proposed cuts will undoubtedly hit them hardest.
“It is not an exaggeration to say that lives will be put at risk.”
The group is to write to Prime Minister Theresa May, highlighting the issue and calling for help in their battle to retain their already stretched services.
They will be pointing out that she has promised a society which works for everyone, and these are the people most in need of all.
An expected crowd of 300 vulnerable people, including disabled, homeless and people with mental health problems – as well as the organisations representing them – are to stage a protest in Victoria Square at 9.30am today calling for the Supporting People budget cuts to be reversed.
The groups rallying under the #saveoursupport banner include Birmingham Mind, Birmingham and Solihull Women’s Aid, St Basils, Midland Mencap, Birmingham Rathbone, BID Services, Birmingham Voluntary Services Council, Birmingham Citizen’s Panel, Crisis, Fry Housing Association, Ashram Moseley HA, Midland Heart, Shelter, Trident Reach and YMCA.
What does the Labour council leader have to say?
BIRMINGHAM City Council leader John Clancy says they would still be investing in, and supporting, the third sector to protect the homeless and other vulnerable citizens.
He stressed that they are budget proposals only at this stage, and that they will look at the responses and consultation feedback before drawing up a final budget which councillors will be asked to approve on February 28.
“This year we are proposing a cut of £5.2 million from the £24 million Supporting People fund,” he said. “We are also still spending another £6 million a year on homelessness.
“We also recently secured extra tralblazer funding to help us deal with rough sleeping
“The city council is still saving lives now, and in the future. We will be working with our partners, the charities and third sector, to ensure that we are spending that money as effectively as we can.”
The Labour leader added: “I have no doubt that the rise in rough sleeping – 43 per cent – has been driven by the Government’s welfare reform policies.
“There is a time for tough love, but we have people getting sanctioned, not being able to pay their bills, ending up on the street, then you have to deal with the consequences of that.”
The public consultation on the council budget runs until Wednesday January 18.
Who does the fund currently help ?
- 13,500 Brummies depend on the Supporting People fund:
- 2,000 people with mental health problems
- 950 people with learning difficulties
- 600 people with physical and sensory disabilities
- 2,100 victims of domestic abuse and violence
- 4,200 vulnerable young people (16-25s), including care leavers
- 750 ex-offenders and those at risk of re-offending
- 1,670 homeless single people
- 520 homeless families
- 787 individuals with drug and/or alcohol dependencies
