Beggars Belief

I don't often read The Sun, but the newspaper performed a public service the other day with its front page splash about a 'Supertramp' beggar in London.

Beggars Belief (6 November 2014)

John Bird, the founder of the Big Issue, is always worth listening to and in this article for The mail newspaper he takes the Labour leader, Ed Miliband, to task for giving money to a young woman beggar, Rebecca State, in the streets of Manchester.

Now it turns out that the young woman was only 14-years-old and if you ask me, her aunt (Livia Stoica) who should be looking after Rebecca, should be challenged by the authorities for what amounts to child neglect.  

One thing's for sure, dropping a few coins into a cup doesn't even begin to tackle the problem.

Giving money to beggars isn't kindness, Ed, it's cruelty. And I should know, I used to be one, says founder of the Big Issue JOHN BIRD 

• John Bird co-founder the Big Issue in 1991 after being a beggar himself 
• Says that Ed Miliband should never have gave money to beggar last week 
• Explains that giving to beggars is not an act of kindness but one of cruelty 
• Adds that it does nothing to alleviate the plight of the recipient 

By JOHN BIRD FOR THE DAILY MAIL

From clumsily eating a bacon sandwich to posing in a ‘feminist’ T-shirt made by exploited female labour, Ed Miliband’s public appearances during recent months have been a catalogue of gaffes.

Few of these moments have been more awkward than his spontaneous decision to give some loose change to a young beggar while he walked along a street in Manchester last week.

If this was an attempt to parade his decency, it backfired disastrously. Instead of looking compassionate, he came across as foolish, opportunistic and embarrassed.

Founder of the Big Issue John Bird, who says giving money to beggars does nothing to alleviate their plight

Much attention has focused on the reportedly small sum he gave the girl, later identified as a 14-year-old Romanian immigrant.

Miliband has also attracted criticism for the disdainful look on his face as he handed over the cash, as if he were repelled by his own action.

Yet that air of self-disgust was appropriate. For Miliband knew only too well that he was doing the wrong thing.

The key problem was not the size of his donation, but the fact that he actually handed over any money at all.

Mr Bird's comments come after Labour leader Ed Miliband was pictured dropping money into a beggar's cup outside Manchester Town Hall

It’s a familiar predicament when we’re faced with another desperate-looking figure huddled on the street, palm outstretched.

It’s only human to feel that impulse to help — to give a few coins to alleviate another’s misery — and, all too often, for that impulse to override the quiet voice which asks: am I really helping?

The answer is no. Giving to a beggar might momentarily salve the donor’s conscience, but in the longer term it does absolutely nothing to alleviate the plight of the recipient.

On the contrary, it locks the beggar in a downward spiral of abject dependency and victimhood, where all self-respect, honesty and hope are lost.

Indeed, by reinforcing the beggar’s pitiable condition, a donation is really an act of cruelty rather than kindness. If there is one thing most beggars detest more than people who refuse to give, it is those who do.

I should know, because I was a beggar for much of my early life. Growing up in an Irish immigrant family in London with a father who made it his life’s mission to single-handedly prop up the drinks trade, I first experienced homelessness at the age of five, and between the ages of seven and ten was raised in an orphanage, supplementing my meagre pocket money with what I could get on the streets.

Mr Bird says that reinforcing the beggar’s pitiable condition, a donation is really an act of cruelty rather than kindness

Begging descended into crime, and through my teenage years I was in and out of prison.

But it was that background which gave me the determination to do something for the homeless beyond the usual mix of counter-productive financial concern and judicial punishment (begging and rough-sleeping have been illegal here since the 16th century).

What I wanted to do was something that would give the destitute a sense of purpose.

So, in 1991, I came up with the idea of the Big Issue magazine, a product which people could sell for a decent profit.

The Big Issue represented dynamic street trade, not degraded street aid. Instead of remaining passive, dependent victims, the sellers would become active merchants, gaining discipline, self-worth and honesty. The initiative was widely adopted here and abroad, transforming institutional attitudes to homelessness.

I am still gaining insights into how well the scheme can work. The other day, I met up with an old mate called Mark Dempster. More than 20 years ago, he was a real hard-case: an alcoholic drug-dealer who lived on the streets and had served time in prisons all over the world.

Mr Miliband made his donation while walking through Manchester with Shadow Transport Secretary Mary Creagh, left, and Manchester Withington candidate Jeff Smith, right

Thanks to the self-respect the Big Issue gave him, he cleaned up his act, escaped his destructive habits and became a responsible adult. He is now a Harley Street specialist in drug and drink addictions, helping others to break free as he did.

The alternative — embodied in Ed Miliband’s desperate move — of people giving money to those who simply sit on the street asking for money, only worsens the begging problem.

Moreover, such an approach amounts to a collusion with criminality, for not only is begging illegal under a host of laws, such as the 1824 Vagrancy Act, but it is often accompanied — as in Mark Dempster’s example — by other law-breaking, like drug possession, theft, disorderly conduct, and even violence.

So there is no doubt that giving to beggars worsens criminality by encouraging the destitute to remain outside the margins of society.

Most of the homeless are mentally ill or in the throes of addiction, so cash enables them to spend more on drink or drugs. Alternatively, they can become part of an organised gang that exploits the public’s generosity.

That is why I often say the Big Issue is a also ‘crime reduction initiative’, because it helps to steer the magazine vendors away from the possibility of sliding into illegal behaviour.

This is true even of the large number of Romanians who now sell the Big Issue on British streets; on my estimates, one in five of all Big Issue vendors is East European.

Now, understandably, many British people strongly object to this trend. Why on earth are we, a small country with overstretched public services, importing destitution on such a scale from Eastern Europe?

The beggar was later revealed to be 14-year-old Rebeca State, who lives with her aunt as her parents have returned to Romania

That is a question not for the Big Issue organisation, but for the politicians such as Ed Miliband who opened the sluice gates and insisted, for ideological reasons, on open borders within Europe. They are the ones who decided the Romanian poor and homeless should be allowed to settle here.

At least the Big Issue gives them work, an income, a roof over their heads and a route away from crime.

But that does not mean I am blind to some of the excesses and abuses. Unfortunately, thanks to the ill-conceived bureaucracy of the welfare system, some Bulgarians and Romanians have been allowed to exploit their positions as vendors to gain self-employed status, opening the way to a raft of income-related welfare benefits. That is certainly true in the case of the girl beggar who Mr Miliband met in Manchester.

Rebeca State, 14, lives with her aunt, Livia Stoica, in rented accommodation; her parents have returned to Romania because of a family illness. As a ‘self-employed’ Big Issue seller six days a week, Ms Stoica can claim £550 a week in welfare.

But again the Big Issue should not be the organisation under attack. It is up to the politicians to close the loopholes over self-employed status and access to social security.

This whole case shows the laxity of the authorities’ approach. Ms Stoica might be within her rights to claim welfare as a self-employed individual, but she should certainly not be allowing her 14-year-old niece out on the streets to break the law by begging.

Are social services and the police investigating? If not, why not? And why is Rebeca, still only a child, not in school or back with her parents?

Mr Bird estimates that one in five people selling the Big Issue on the street are of Eastern European decent (file picture)

I fear the answer is there is far too much sentimentality and cowardice in our political system, which has been ruthlessly exploited by society’s parasites.

I have absolutely no time for the pathetic, bleeding-heart mentality so prevalent these days — and which destroys traditional concepts of morality and justice.

I firmly believe that anyone who breaks the law or abuses our generosity should be deported — not protected by the morally perverted human rights regime which allows them to remain in this country on the basis of their so-called ‘right to a family life’.

Indeed, early this year I led calls for the deportation of Razvan Dumitru, a Romanian Big Issue seller based in North London who robbed a blind pensioner of £50 when she tried to pay him for the magazine.

For this sickening crime, he was sentenced to just four months in prison.

But it is the politicians who created this mess, through their contempt for our borders, reluctance to uphold our laws, and remorseless expansion of our welfare benefits.

Ed Miliband’s desperate donation is a classic illustration of warped priorities and lack of ethical rigour. He should be ashamed of himself.

Beggars Belief (23 June 2014)

The BBC reports that the Scottish Government has turned down a proposed by-law to ban street begging in Aberdeen which strikes me as wrong on two counts:

1 Whatever happened to local democracy?

2 Street begging is completely unnecessary in this day and age, and ought to be banned.

A friend of mine observed a young man begin in Glasgow the other day while talking on his iPhone which speaks to the fact that the majority of these street beggars are from organised gangs who often use teenage children to increase their 'appeal'.

Now that to me is child abuse and the authorities should step in to put an end to this kind of exploitative behaviour, so I hope Aberdeen doesn't take this decision lying down.

Aberdeen begging by-law plan rejected by Scottish ministers

Scottish ministers have rejected a proposed by-law to ban street begging in some parts of Aberdeen.

The city council had applied for the controversial law because it said the area had a particular problem.

It would have made begging illegal within pre-designated zones, but objectors said existing legislation allowed the police to deal with the problem effectively.

Councillors had voted to pursue the by-law last year.

Street Begging (25 April 2014)

I listened to an interesting debate on Radio Scotland the other day about a proposal from Aberdeen City Council to introduce a local by-law to make begging in the streets unlawful.

The councillor from Aberdeen, whose name I didn't catch, made the sensible point that a local by-law some years ago had been brought in to outlaw the consumption of alcohol in public places, so why not do the same in relation to begging.

The chap also revealed that in a recent police operation 32 persistent beggars were identified in Aberdeen, but that none of them were homeless although clearly they had other problems requiring some kind of support and intervention.

The Highland Hostel for the Homeless also waded into the discussion and expressed its support for getting beggars off the street because whatever problems people were experiencing the worse place to be was sitting alone on a city pavement for several hours a day.

In Glasgow, as in other cities, there are organised groups of beggars who travel hundreds of miles to beg in Scotland, sometimes using young children as part of their activities, and again this is a practice that ought to be discouraged because they are simply trying to inveigle money out of people under false pretences.

So who knows what may happen, but I applaud the initiative being taken in Aberdeen because they appear to be doing something to tackle the underlying problems of persistent begging on our streets which is a much better strategy, if you ask me, than just walking on by or leaving the people involved to their own devices.