My first year with Crisis at Christmas

My kitchen overlooks a busy road in south London. Directly opposite, outside a shop, I can see Peter (not his real name) sitting almost every evening, asking passers-by for spare change.

Since I moved here three years ago, I have seen Peter go through several stages of homelessness. He lost his home, began sleeping rough and temporarily went into a hostel, which he then decided to leave because, he tells me, it wasn’t good for him.

He has a gentle nature and a love of cats. Before he became homeless he had a couple of his own. Peter has problems with alcohol and drugs, and I have noticed his weight fluctuate and his skin age since we first met. There have been occasions when I’ve found him slumped over and I’ve had to go over and check he was breathing.

Seeing Peter almost every day made me want to do something about a problem that, far from going away, is actually getting worse.

I heard about Crisis at Christmas a few years ago and thought it would be the best way of helping people like Peter. So, this Christmas, I signed up as a volunteer for three morning shifts (7.45am–4pm) at the South London Day Centre in Bermondsey.

The centre, located in a secondary school, was open every day from 23-29 December and offers a range of services including hot meals, a salon providing haircuts, shaves and manicures, clothing (including alterations and repairs), massage and other holistic therapies. It also has an optician, a dentist, a podiatrist and offers general medical care. In addition, there are activities such as arts and crafts, football and yoga.

Crucially, guests have the chance to visit advice services which can help them move out of vulnerable accommodation. My first shift was on the opening day and I spent a couple of hours on the ‘referrals desk’, booking guests appointments with advice services.

Every single guest I spoke to wanted somewhere to sleep that night. Appointments with the Crisis outreach team quickly filled up, which unsurprisingly caused some anxiety among guests. I had to tell people to wait for three hours before they could speak to someone, meaning they had to spend even more time worrying about where they would spend the night. I asked people if they were interested in seeing the housing advice team to get some longer-term support but most seemed too tired to think about it. I hope throughout the week they felt in a better position to seek this support.

“Crisis at Christmas gives people the chance to momentarily forget about their problems and spend Christmas somewhere safe and warm.”

There were around 200 guests (the centre’s full capacity) on Tuesday 27 December, when I did my second shift. Approximately 80% were men – mainly from Eastern Europe. Some of the experienced volunteers told me they saw the same guests year after year – a sad reflection of the lack of progress made to reduce homelessness in London. One man I chatted to said he’d been visiting the centre for the past 20 years.

However, there are some success stories. One of the volunteers on my shifts used to visit the centre as a guest and turned her life around with the help of Crisis. I was pleased to learn that this happens quite a lot and there are a number of volunteers who used to be guests.

A man who I spoke to while I was taking clothing orders wanted a suit as he had a job interview that afternoon. I later learned that he had been struggling with drug addiction but had managed to get clean and rekindle his relationship with his son.

After three very busy shifts (unfortunately all the Crisis at Christmas London centres were short on volunteers this year), my brain had a lot to process – both positive and negative. But, overall, I enjoyed the experience. Seeing the guests laughing together over a good meal or singing karaoke almost made me forget why I was there. That’s part of the beauty of Crisis at Christmas: it gives people the chance to momentarily forget about their problems and spend Christmas somewhere safe and warm in the company of others.

I feel happy to have been part of something that is helping people pull themselves out of homelessness, and like many of the volunteers, I think I’ve caught the Crisis at Christmas bug. I’ll be signing up to volunteer at the South London Day Centre in 2017 as soon as registration opens.

I hope by then, government efforts to tackle homelessness will mean Peter is no longer outside the shop across the road.

Lucy Brown, sub-editor, Inside Housing