Rough sleeping to be decriminalised
Rough sleeping is to be decriminalised after the government pledged to get rid of a 200-year-old law against vagrancy.
Labour said the Vagrancy Act, which became law in 1824 and criminalises 'idle and disorderly persons, and rogues and vagabonds, in England', will be repealed by next spring.
Angela Rayner, the deputy prime minister, who is also housing secretary, said Labour was 'drawing a line under nearly two centuries of injustice towards some of the most vulnerable in society'.
She said: 'No one should ever be criminalised simply for sleeping rough and by scrapping this cruel and outdated law, we are making sure that can never happen again.'
Rushanara Ali, the homelessness minister, said the 'archaic' law was 'neither just nor fit for purpose'.
She added: 'Scrapping the Vagrancy Act for good is another step forward in our mission to tackle homelessness in all its forms, by focusing our efforts on its root causes.'
The government said new 'targeted measures will ensure police have the powers they need to keep communities safe — filling the gap left over by removing previous powers'. These will be brought in through amendments to the Crime and Policing Bill.
There will be new offences of facilitating begging for gain and trespassing with the intention of committing a crime.
Ministers said that means organised begging by criminal gangs will remain a crime. It will be illegal for anyone to organise others to beg.
Homelessness charities hailed the law change. Matt Downie, the Crisis chief executive, said: 'This is a landmark moment that will change lives and prevent thousands of people from being pushed into the shadows, away from safety.'
He praised the government for showing 'principled leadership in scrapping this pernicious act'.
He said: 'We hope this signals a completely different approach to helping people forced on to the streets and clears the way for a positive agenda that is about supporting people who desperately want to move on in life and fulfil their potential. We look forward to assisting the UK government with their forthcoming homelessness strategy to do exactly that.'
Emma Haddad, chief executive of St Mungo's, said the act's repeal 'cannot come soon enough' and called for a 'focus on tackling the health, housing and wider societal issues that are causing homelessness in the first place'.
Centrepoint, the youth homelessness charity, warned that a challenge would be 'ensuring that proposed amendments don't have the unintended consequences of punishing people instead of supporting them'.
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