The Evening Standard launched a campaign to tackle homelessness in London yesterday in a bid to “raise awareness, raise money and change minds”.
Now edited by former-Chancellor and cheerleader for austerity cuts, George Osborne, it didn’t take long for people to call out the irony of their attempt to alleviate a problem he helped create.
140 per cent increase
The number of people sleeping rough has increased substantially since the Conservatives were elected into government in 2010 and were allowed to impose harsh austerity cuts on people and services across the country.
In 2010 just 3,673 people were homeless in the capital, according to London datastore and St Mungos data.
Today that number has increased by over 140 per cent to 8,855. It had risen to 8,108 by 2016 when Osborne quit as Chancellor.
Today’s @EveningStandard: we launch our biggest ever campaign, tackling homelessness, starting this Christmas with a focus on homeless women pic.twitter.com/gNfDa9vHE2
— George Osborne (@George_Osborne) November 20, 2019
Irony
Twitter users were quick to point out the irony of the move.
Jamie McKelvie said: “Well well, if it isn’t the consequences of my own actions”, while Ash Sarkar pointed out that Osborne “presided over brutal benefits cuts, the bedroom tax, the decimation of social housing provision, and a 70 per cent rise in child homelessness” as Chancellor.
This Christmas
More than 22,000 vulnerable young people will be at risk of being homeless in the weeks leading up to Christmas, a charity has claimed.
Centrepoint said thousands of people aged 16 to 25 in England could find themselves sleeping rough or “sofa surfing” around the festive period this year.
The youth homelessness charity said the “worrying” figure exceeds the capacity of the 02 Arena in London.
Related: Priti Patel says poverty “isn’t the government’s fault” while stood in a food bank
