‘I thought I’d be dead by now’ – can Labour use Blair template to cut ‘shameful’ levels of rough sleeping?
Ian Harrison watches a film in which, 16 years ago, he is on the streets begging for money in Covent Garden.
Recorded in 2008, we see a fresh-faced 19-year-old Ian, who has been evicted from his flat, telling the camera he is going to take as many drugs as he can get.
“I want to get so far gone, all my problems go away, just for tonight,” he says.
Watching this, 35-year-old Ian blinks slowly.
He nods and lets out a big sigh. Then his teenage self says something prescient: “Nothing changes, only time, and the people I’m begging from.”
Ian nods again: “He is right. Look where I am now!”
Ian is still homeless, his face now wears the years he’s lived on the streets and the addiction to heroin and crack he is still battling.
And although he has a room in a hostel for the moment, his life is on the same cliff-edge it was all those years ago.
It is significant that Ian became homeless in the late 2000s, towards the end of the Blair/Brown era, when a drive to tackle rough sleeping had successfully reduced numbers on the streets by two-thirds and kept them low for a sustained period.
Ian’s been living rough since 2008, when he was still a teenager
He was in a film years ago showing him begging in London
The 2008 financial crisis and subsequent global economic downturn saw homelessness numbers begin to rise, and steadily do so for a decade until a period during the pandemic triggered a drive to get people off the streets.
But now it is peaking again and last year Ian was among 11,993 rough sleepers in London – the highest ever recorded in the capital.
Labour‘s deputy prime minister, Angela Rayner, described the situation as “shameful” as she took over the task of sorting it out.
Deputy PM Angela Rayner is in charge of tackling the problem. Pic: PA
Ms Rayner will lead a new cross-government taskforce to tackle the issue, which has echoes of Tony Blair‘s cross-department approach.
However, the success of Blair’s rough sleeping unit, launched in 1999, was also attributed to its focus on attempting to tackle the causes of homelessness, not just finding people places to stay.
This is something Ian feels is lacking now.
Despite having a roof over his head, his single room looks like the streets have followed him in.
Ian grew up in care and says he never had anyone to show him the basic things in life
The floor is covered in rubbish, the sink and walls stained, flies buzz around a small boxy space that smells not dissimilar to the cardboard home he lived in under the Hammersmith flyover a few months ago.
Ian grew up in care and says he hasn’t learned how to look after himself.
He says: “I struggle with a lot of basic things in life. I never had parents to say brush your teeth, get in the shower do this, do that, when you grow up into an adult you don’t have that stuff.”
‘Hard to be stable in a place like this’
He is off the drugs and has a prescription for methadone, but says his environment doesn’t help.
“It’s hard to be stable in a place like this, because it’s a very unstable place to be in,” he says.
“If you are picking someone up and putting them in a hostel with 26 other people who are all addicts, it’s not going to take long before it’s going to rub off on you.”
He is in supported accommodation but says it doesn’t offer the support he needs, which is self-care, organisation and, frankly, a great deal of therapy.
No one has ever addressed the root causes of Ian’s problems.
Ian says his supported accommodation is not helping him get better
“From a very young age, you know, I went through a lot of sexual abuse, mental abuse, physical abuse, which was sustained daily, for years,” he says.
“They say you need therapy, but to get the therapy you need to be completely clean of drugs and alcohol for a couple of years. But that’s part of the illness, it’s part of the symptoms of the illness.”
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‘Stuck in a merry-go-round for 20 years’
It will be the task of Ms Rayner’s cross-department team to try to turn around the lives of people like Ian – and it won’t be cheap.
But the Sky News producer who filmed the footage back in 2008 and has known Ian since that time, has seen him go through countless hostels (around 30, says Ian) and mental institutions, only to eventually end up back out on the streets.
The long-term cost of not solving Ian’s problems is incalculable.
“I’ve been stuck in a merry-go-round for 20 years,” he says.
“l become homeless, get into a hostel, become homeless. You give up.”
Asked what his 19-year-old self would have hoped to being doing in his 30s, Ian says: “To be honest, I thought I’d be dead by now. And I wouldn’t have cared if I was.”
But Ian does care now.
A wish list, written on his hostel wall, reads: “Stop using all drugs, save up more cash, care 4 self better, start up business, go to gym, get routine, have camping holiday.”
To achieve this, he is going to need the kind of help that has eluded him all his life.
Downing Street has indicated Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would be arrested if he arrived on British soil following an international arrest warrant being issued for him.
On Thursday, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and former Israeli defence secretary Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity related to the war in Gaza.
The UK government was reluctant to commit to saying Netanyahu would be arrested if he came to the UK but Sir Keir Starmer’s spokesman said the government would “fulfil its legal obligations” in relation to the arrest warrant.
“The UK will always comply with its legal obligations as set out by domestic law, and indeed international law,” he said.
He added the domestic process linked to ICC arrest warrants has never been used to date by the UK because the country has never been visited by anyone wanted by the international court.
Earlier on Friday, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said it “wouldn’t be appropriate for me to comment” on the processes involved as the ICC is independent, although the UK is a member.
She told Sky News: “We’ve always respected the importance of international law, but in the majority of the cases that they pursue, they don’t become part of the British legal process.
“What I can say is that obviously, the UK government’s position remains that we believe the focus should be on getting a ceasefire in Gaza.”
However, Emily Thornberry, Labour chair of the foreign affairs committee in parliament, told Sky News: “If Netanyahu comes to Britain, our obligation under the Rome Convention would be to arrest him under the warrant from the ICC.
“Not really a question of should, we are required to because we are members of the ICC.”
After winning July’s election the government said it would not oppose the ICC’s right to issue the warrants.
Netanyahu and Gallant (right) have arrest warrants against them. File pic: Reuters
Ireland, France and Italy have signalled they would arrest Netanyahu if he came to their countries.
Asked if police would arrest the Israeli leader in Ireland, Irish Taoiseach Simon Harris said: “Yes, absolutely. We support international courts and we apply their warrants.”
Germany said it would make a decision if Netanyahu came to Germany but said it is one of the “biggest supporters of the ICC”, partly as a result of history.
A German government spokesman said: “At the same time, it is a consequence of German history that we share unique relations and a great responsibility with Israel.”
An ICC arrest warrant was also issued for Hamas leader Mohammed Diab Ibrahim al Masri, the mastermind behind the 7 October attacks in Israel, for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Israel claims Al Masri was killed earlier this year but the ICC said that has not been confirmed, so it was issuing the arrest warrant.
Netanyahu’s office said the warrants against him and Gallant were “antisemitic” and said Israel “rejects with disgust the absurd and false actions”.
Neither Israel nor the US are members of the ICC. Israel has rejected the court’s jurisdiction and denies committing war crimes in Gaza.
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Why have arrest warrants been issued?
US President Joe Biden described the warrants against Israeli leaders as “outrageous”, adding: “Whatever the ICC might imply, there is no equivalence – none – between Israel and Hamas.”
Former Israeli prime minister Naftali Bennett said the warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant were a “mark of shame” for the ICC.
The Board of Deputies of British Jews said the ICC’s decision sent a “terrible message”.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Friday he would invite Netanyahu to visit Hungary and he would guarantee the arrest warrant would “not be observed”.
The ICC originally said it was seeking arrest warrants for the three men in May for the alleged crimes and on Thursday announced that it had rejected challenges by Israel and issued warrants of arrest.
In its update, the ICC said it found “reasonable grounds to believe” that Netanyahu and Gallant “bear criminal responsibility” for alleged crimes.
These, the court said, include “the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare; and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts”.
It is the first time a sitting leader of a major Western ally has been accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity by a global court of justice.
Hundreds of people affected by the Manchester Arena bombing cannot continue legal action against MI5, judges have ruled.
More than 300 people, including survivors and those bereaved by the 2017 attack at an Ariana Grande concert, brought a case to the Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT), claiming failures to take “appropriate measures” to prevent the incident infringed their human rights.
In a ruling on Friday, Lord Justice Singh and Mrs Justice Farbey said the cases could not proceed as they were brought too late.
Lord Justice Singh said: “We are particularly conscious of the importance of the rights concerned… We are also conscious of the horrendous impact of the atrocity on the claimants and their families.
“Any reasonable person would have sympathy for them.
“The grief and trauma which they have suffered, particularly where young children were killed, is almost unimaginable.
“Nevertheless, we have reached the conclusion that, in all the circumstances, it would not be equitable to permit the claims to proceed.”
File pic: AP
Lord Justice Singh acknowledged that while the tribunal “readily understand” why the legal claims were not filed until after the final report from the inquiry into the attack, “real expedition” was needed at that point.
The judge added: “We bear in mind the other matters that had to be investigated and arrangements which had to be put in place but, in our view, the filing of the proceedings was not given the priority which, assessed objectively, it should have been.”
Had the claims gone ahead, the judge noted the security services would have needed to “divert time and resources to defending these proceedings rather than their core responsibilities” – which includes preventing future attacks.
Salman Abedi killed 22 people and injured hundreds when he detonated a rucksack bomb at the end of an Ariana Grande show at Manchester Arena on 22 May 2017.
Manchester Arena bomber Salman Abedi
Hudgell Solicitors, Slater & Gordon and Broudie Jackson Canter, three of the law firms representing complainants affected, said the ruling was “extremely disappointing” for their clients.
In a statement, the firms said: “Ever since the attack in May 2017, our clients have had to endure continued delays but have done so with great patience and understanding in the hope that by allowing all legal processes to be fully explored, transparency and justice would be achieved.
“It took almost six years for the failings of MI5 to be revealed, confirmed when the inquiry chair published his volume three findings in March 2023, in which he said MI5 had missed a ‘significant opportunity’ to prevent the attack.
“This report concluded that within this six-year period, the security service corporate witnesses X and J gave evidence on oath that had presented an inaccurate picture, and the same inaccurate picture had been presented to Lord Anderson when he compiled his report in December 2017.”
Read more from Sky News:
‘Blood on their hands’: Could MI5 have prevented the Manchester attack?
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The law firms said following these findings, their clients believed the IPT would “provide the route to the formal vindication of their human rights”.
The firms added: “We are disappointed that time is one of the reasons now being used against them to prevent their claims progressing. Seven years have now passed since the atrocity in May 2017 – six years of that seven-year delay was caused by MI5.
“This judgment certainly doesn’t exonerate MI5. There were failings by MI5 and multiple other parties leading up to and on the actual evening of 22 May 2017 and collectively we continue to support our clients in their fight for full accountability and justice.”
Police with members of the public after the attack. Pic: PA
The inquiry into the bombing found it might have been prevented if MI5 had acted on key intelligence received in the months before the attack.
The agency’s director-general, Ken McCallum, expressed deep regret that such intelligence was not obtained.
Two pieces of information about Abedi were assessed at the time by the security service to not relate to terrorism.
But inquiry chairman Sir John Saunders said, having heard from MI5 witnesses at the hearings, he considered that did not present an “accurate picture”.
Lawyers for those affected previously said the inquiry found there was a “real possibility” that one of the pieces of intelligence could have obtained information which may have led to actions preventing the attack.
And at the hearing earlier this month, Pete Weatherby KC, for those affected, described the IPT claims as “the next step” in vindication for his clients after the inquiry’s findings.
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