Rayner rough sleeping plan ‘could lead to San Francisco-style tent cities'
Angela Rayner's plans to decriminalise rough sleeping could lead to San Francisco-style tent cities in Britain, the Tories have warned.
The Deputy Prime Minister announced on Tuesday that the Vagrancy Act, introduced in 1824 to tackle a worsening homelessness crisis after the Industrial Revolution, will be repealed by next spring.
However, the Tories claimed the plans would create a 'charter for chaos' if Labour failed to replace the repealed Act with new offences to tackle nuisance rough sleeping and begging.
The Tories' proposals for repealing the Act when they were in government included two offences that would have given police powers to prosecute nuisance beggars and rough sleeping, which covered any damage they did to property and the environment including 'excessive' noise, litter and waste.
Labour insists the police will be able to tackle nuisance begging and rough sleeping by using existing powers in the Crime and Policing Act of 2014, which were created to combat anti-social behaviour.
Ms Rayner has also proposed new laws to target organised begging by gangs and trespassing with intention to commit a crime to replace powers in the Act which will be repealed.
The row comes during a sharp rise in homelessness which has led to encampments sprouting up even in some of the most prosperous areas of cities. Last September, rough sleepers set up a camp of some 24 tents on Park Lane in central London.
The number of people classed as living on the streets in London has risen by more than a third (38 per cent) year-on-year to 706 from 511, according to figures for April.
The number recorded as sleeping rough in the capital has also increased by 8 per cent, to 4,427 in the three months to March this year, from 4,118 in the same quarter last year.
'Charter for chaos'
Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, said: 'Ms Rayner's plans are a charter for chaos. The Government is repealing legislation without providing an adequate replacement.
'The police will not have the powers needed to ensure that high streets and town and city centres are kept clear of nuisance rough sleeping.
'Of course, people need to be helped and supported but the police also need the powers to take action when necessary to maintain order in city centres and maintain a pleasant environment for the majority.
'This move risks turning British cities into a version of San Francisco, which has become overrun by encampments of homeless people.
'We need to ensure support but there needs to be strong enforcement powers as well.'
But in a letter to MPs Dame Diana Johnson, the policing minister, said the Government was 'satisfied that generally where nuisance begging meets the threshold of anti-social behaviour, it is open to the police and others to use the existing powers in the Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014'.
She said the Home Office would issue statutory guidance to police to 'make this clear' so officers could tackle nuisance begging that caused distress to the public and residents.
Two new offences will replace powers which were in the Vagrancy Act, she added. An offence of arranging or facilitating begging for gain would target people who organised begging gangs or drove people to places for them to beg. It would carry a maximum sentence of six months in jail.
An offence of trespassing with intent to commit a criminal offence would replicate the one already in the 1824 act with a maximum penalty of three months in jail.
Ms Rayner has also secured an extra £233 million this financial year to provide a total of nearly £1 billion for support services to divert homeless people away from the street and rough sleeping and into accommodation.
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