So..please tell me what I should actually do when I see someone who appears to be homeless begging?

[FlyingD]

My daughter feels upset about people who are rough sleeping and sees that I don't give money to them all. I explained that I give to food banks to help but she says she can't walk past as she feels so sad for them. What do I tell her? Anyone work with street homeless people?

I donate to charities and when I see someone begging or homeless I call a local charity who send out a worker to help them.

I’m semi ashamed to admit it but I don’t stop and I don’t give them money. A) because I literally never have cash on me and B) because when we were at uni a friend was attacked by someone posing as a homeless man when she stopped to give him money. She genuinely thought she was going to die or be raped and the impact on her has stuck with me so I just can’t do it. My charity donations are substantial though, to reflect this moral failing of mine.

This sounds like you do it to make yourself feel good. For a homeless person a pound isn't going to really help them look after themselves. Whilst it's better than nothing, it's strange to have a set minimal amount.

It'd be more beneficial to give one person a tenner then ten people a pound.

Give if you want to, can afford to and are ok with it potentially being a scam.

People always say give food and drink, never money but there are only so many sandwiches and cups of tea one person can have.

They can't use a sub roll as a tampon or brush their teeth with Tetley.

Homeless people have more needs than food and drink.

And if one of those needs is alcohol or drugs then fuck it. If I was living on the streets, freezing cold and treated like a sub human, maybe I'd need to have a damned drink!

Your DD is young and altruistic and thinks everyone is genuine. She hasn’t experienced the scams and lies that most adults are only too well acquainted with. I remember when I was young and poor, a man begged me for money and I gave it to him - then he pulled an expensive leather jacket out of his sleeping bag and threw it on as he got picked up in a posh car. That was the last time I gave directly to a beggar, now I donate to charities not individuals.

I was approached once in the street by a woman who said she needed money for a hostel. I gave her £5. Losing that £5 made no difference to me, but it MIGHT, MIGHT have made a difference to her. And if she was a scammer? Well, I was scammed but I'd want someone to help me if I was in such a spot that I felt the need to ask random people on the street for help.

There's a man who sells the big issue near my home. I banged into him in Costco. Rumour has it that he also runs a scrap metal firm.....

My friend once got asked for a fiver at the door of Asda by a young woman who was sobbing because she’d lost her bus fare. The woman thanked her profusely and asked for my friend’s address so she could post the fiver back to her. When my friend got home her house had been broken into. Obviously they knew if she was heading into Asda with a large trolley and a load of bags she was going to be there for an hour or two.

Report to streetlink. They will send a notification to the local authority homeless team, who will go out/send an outreach service. 9/10 the homeless person will be known to services, or not actually be homeless.

The official advice is to not give money, basically to try to coax the marginalised into more engagement with social services & actually sorting out their big problems. Personally, I like to give 50p or a quid & stop for a chat. A bit of human contact. How are you? Are you warm enough? How's today going? etc. I have discovered that chats are very well received.

Ask if they have registered at the local council. Ask if you can ring them for them. Give them the referral number of the shelters locally. Give them information on where they can get a good hot meal.

By all means donate to an organisation that helps homeless people but don't give them money.

NB: Locally many of them are just begging. Some of them in Manchester centre are dropped off and rotate round the different spots.

Nothing.

Too many scammers and addicts. And the more people say “I didn’t miss that fiver,” the more people are encouraged to go round scamming for a living.

And no, I don’t buy into the idea that if you’re funding an addiction you should be understanding. I won’t fund someone’s potential last hit, and I won’t fund the industry that is the drugs industry. By giving money to someone for drugs you are essentially condoning human trafficking and everything else that goes with drug dealing.

There was a homeless person outside our local tesco the other day with a sign saying that if you didn’t have cash he had a card machine. [Shock]

Yeah, it's not all straightforward helping people who want or need your help. I've tried buying sandwiches etc and been looked at like I was crazy and why would they want that. I've also walked behind two men in Bath having a chat, 'oh I'm just going home', 'what you doing later?' 'might come back into town and do a bit of beggin.'... Another time an old man sleeping rough on a station told my mum and teenage me he had dug graves to put us in.

It's a tough one OP. You don't know what is going on in people's lives or like with any stranger when you're a teen, how safe it is to engage with them. I agree it's better to support a local organisation to be sure you're doing the right thing.

I don't give on the street any more. I reacted to a girl's story on the street once a few years ago and gave her enough money which I realised later could well have meant she could kill herself with an overdose. I did it not because I'm generous but because I wanted to get away from her.

I think op, talk about it with your daughter. Ask her why she feels that if someone asks her for something, she has to give it. Explain that when the pandemic happened, everyone was housed. That had problems of its own of course, and you can explain that some people have illnesses that make it very difficult to live a life that she would recognise. But that we as a society can choose to work on people's problems and can make life better for them. There are organisations that can help with that and they're run by grownups who are experts. Perhaps look together for a local organisation that works with homeless people and read some stories about their lives.

There's a couple of people and it's been confirmed rather than speculation in the town near me, that apparently are not actually in need, but use it to fund x habits.

If you want to help, maybe set them up with a Totaljobs account and apply for some nearby work, then get them an interview outfit.

The other option, @FlyingD some lose change ?

If you don’t want to give money/ food then don’t it’s not Law that you have.

If you can afford it just give them a £1. It will make your daughter happy and them.
Yes most of them may be addicts but you not giving then £1 is not going to make them clean. There's only so many sandwiches a homeless addict can eat.

I always give cash although carry a lot less these days... 😕

If I was homeless I'd want to be off my head to cope with it. Who am I to dictate how they spend their money?

Performative for both sides 🤷‍♀️

Give money.

I have been homeless, so has my husband and multiple friends. If they want to spend it on what helps to get them through the night, well so be it. I don't think most people understand how it is to be going through heroin and alcohol withdrawals in a shop doorway at night (not me but many of my friends).

Give them the choice.

I have seen many people here in Bristol with several meal deals lined up on the pavement where they're begging just to show that they don't need any more food.

Not saying it's great and in a perfect world it wouldn't happen but hey, it does, and I'd prefer to support people in their own needed way.

Exactly this

I used to give regularly to a supposedly homeless man with a dog, who was in our local high street for years - until he was ‘outed’ by a local paper, which revealed that he had is own flat (owned, not rented) and a nice stash in the bank

I don't believe these stories. Would someone who owned their own flat and had a stash in the bank really be arsed to sit on a dirty cold pavement all day just to get some cash and probablybget verbally abused in the process?

So you’re happy to fund human trafficking then?

Drug addiction does not happen in isolation, and if you are funding a drug addict you are contributing to the industries which are behind the drugs trade.

So next time you hear about people being trafficked, sometimes young girls into the sex trade you can hold up your hands and say “yep, I contributed to that.”

Talking about it not being for us to judge if someone feels they need drugs to help them through is pure virtue signally and gives no consideration to the issues behind what you’re donating to.

I carry cash for the homeless- give them enough to get food - or whatever else helps - not my business - I give the money without conditions. Dh gives to a shelter in London - monthly dd, wasn’t keen on handing the cash out but come around to my thinking - often have a brief chat with them too.