London's lost 4000

Nearly 4000 men and women were sleeping rough on the streets of London by the last count, most of them men and 6% of them veterans from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. The figures come from Crisis, the national charity for the single homeless who are not entitled to housing help. Their figure is 10 times higher than the one given hy the government, which has supported the undertaking of the Mayor, Boris Johnson, to end rough sleeping by this year.
The rough sleeping and dying during the sub-zero nights last month turned a new spotlight on London's shame. The suicide rate is high. Outside London, the largest numbers of rough sleepers are in Cornwall (65),Herefordshire (42), Bradford (23), Maidstone (27) and Peterborough and Exeter (both 21).
On the pavement near the Cafe Rouge in Hampstead this week was one of the veterans, begging, with his Border collie Tim. This is his story.
"I served my country for six years in Iraq and Helmand, and my knees were broken in a land minesweeping operation. My best mate was killed next to me," (his eyes fill with tears.)
"I've asked for help from the Salvation Army, the British Legion, St. Mungo's, but they didn't want to know. Doors were slammed in my face."
Tim the dog, full of affection for him, is one reason - no room for him at the hostels, though St. Mungo's say they have a few hostels which do take dogs.
But London is a big place. Advice often entails going to another part, miles away, without any means of transport or money.
John's tale has a special tragedy. In 2007 he was returning from Iraq with others from his regiment (he gives details of his Army record and postings). "At Brize Norton, we were sitting waiting for our families to meet us, but mine never came. In the end, I was the only one left waiting. I tried to contact them, I knew something was wrong. My wife Deb, phoned to say she was on her way with our three children and Tim the puppy. That was the last time I spoke to them."
They had all been killed in a car crash involving an overturned fire engine, he said. Tim was the only survivor. From now on, they were to cling to each other.
But John then had a breakdown. He said he was voluntarily sectioned and taken to St. Ann's hospital in north London, where he stayed for three months, while Timds was put into kennels.
So who helped him when he came out? "No one. I couldn't face going back to our council house in Wood Green with them not there, so I didn't have ID and without that, I could get nothing. I went to the Salvation Army and asked them to help me get it, but they wouldn't. The hospital just sent me out with nothing. I needed a shoulder to cry on, at least some psychiatric help. There was nothing and the Army didn't help even after all those years service." He got Tim back, somehow got a sleeping bag and for over four years has been sleeping on the Heath. "I had a tent but it was taken away because I had no fishing licence and only fishermen were allowed them."
His only relative, a stepsister, is married in California to an American she met in London. His mother is dead, the stepfather who beat him long gone. He had known his wife since their schooldays in Muswell Hill. She was 38 when she was killed, her children 19, 17, and 12 - their names are all tattooed on his right arm. He is now just 46. "I loved her so much, think of her all the time still."
Why did he join the Army? "Because I loved my country. I was a chef in the West End (which explains his surprising distaste for food scraps offered to him by passers-by.) But he is no longer proud of his country. He is full of exploding anger. "I served all this time for my country, now it will not help me. I've been turned away by everyone. No one helps, you're shoved from pillar to post. The homeless on crutches, in wheelchairs,it's the same for them too."
And he is angry at the parlous state of non-English speaking immigrants, without food or shelter, huddled together behind Camden Lock every night. "It's terrible, they're terrified and all they can do is hide."
His wounded kneecaps and lack of food and money make it difficult for him to walk, but he and Tim soldier on, going to Camden Town as well as Hampstead.
Yet the saddest part of his story comes next. Because this is Hampstead, the home as everyone says of liberal do-gooders, help has come as he sat begging with an empty Starbucks coffe cup. on the pavement. Two people whisked him off to Islington Town Hall, waited and paid for quick delivery of his birth certificate and gave him and Tim some breakfast. Then one of their contacts organised a single room in Tottenham, which would be his first roof shelter for nearly five years. His birth certificate would entitle him to the relevant benefits and help, but not for another two months. The deposit was paid on the room for him but then rent required. An appeal was made to St. Mungo's, two street collectors having spotted him.
Dangling the key, he was overjoyed. But not for long. Four mile tramps with Tim, taking his sleeping gear and other belongings over to Tottenham, followed. The electric meter was registering a debt in the room, and he had no money for it. Someone had died there and their clothes were still there, flea-ridden. Three days of tramping backwards and forwards with Tim followed.
The epilepsy had started when he got back from Iraq. Now he had his first fit for a long time. The local hospital wanted to keep him in but that would mean losing Tim, so he opted out. Six prescriptions were given to him, but all had to be paid for and he had no money. Helpful people told him that at the Charing Cross homeless centre he could get a form to apply for free prescriptions, but walking there was too far in the present condition of his feet and health.
"I csn't stand the loneliness," he said after the first few nights. "There's no one to talk to like there was on the Heath. I feel I'm losing my mind."

Then he was told he was being moved to a room in Enfield. His Tottenham room was to be fumigated. The clothes he had tried to throw away but had been refused by the collectors were at last removed, floorboards taken up to deal with the flea infestation. The new room was even further away from his old nesting place on the Heath, but he tramped there with Tim, and found he could at last have the hot bath he had been looking foward to, and electricity and - unexpectedly - a breakfast delivery. It turned out to be a bed and breakfast but nobody had told him that it was, and that it would cost £33 a week. No benefits or job centre for another month, so back to begging to raise the money, still ill from the epilepsy and other ailments the hospital had found. Again, they wanted him to be an in-patient. He had been there for two nights while it was arranged for Tim to be in kennels. "It was good, being looked after and having a bed." They wanted him to be there for longer, but he had to think of Tim who gets disturbed without him.
The loneliness has continued. John has gone back to sleeping on the Heath sometimes to avoid it.
It seems that his plight has worsened since the various efforts to help him have caused him more difficulties because they do not link up, leaving him with new problems without any resources to solve them. He and the dog looked better when they were sleeping on the Heath and begging, even when it was cold.
"I feel like topping myself," he said last week. "I would do if it wasn't for Tim." Tim is still in good condition and looks at him adoringly. But the dog is not as lively as he was when they were sleeping out and the depression is getting to him too. It is well known that the first move into a solitary room can at first be a worse experience than rough sleeping.
But a surprise was in store, in the form of a heavily official document announcing that he had qualified for a pin bid for a flat from the housing authority. This worried him, though one of his Hampstead unofficial helpers told him that all he had to do was nothing, and wait and see. And now, at last, he has been given somewhere with a bathroom and a bedroom and plenty of space for Tim. But he cannot move in until the end of April, so there will have to be more begging and probably more hospital visits. Also, he will have to find rent and a bed to sleep on and a chair to sit on and, his biggest hope, a TV set so he can watch East Enders.
His anger against his country still hasn't abated - that so many are still homeless as well as sleeping rough, that there seems no will to link up the various sources that could help those suffering from personal disaster. Policemen would move him on roughly and threaten arrest even though he was causing no trouble and people were stopping to pat Tim.
"No one really helps the homeless. They need to stop the promises and show some truths."
St. Mungo has provided him with a weatherproof jacket and said that they seek more linking-up of services between various organisations, including local authorities. Their challenge, they said, was to provide everyone with a decent space to live, something meaningful to do, satisfying relationships and good health. That challenge, so far, is proving impossible to meet unless Britain, and especially London, starts to have a conscience at last about the thousands with no roof at night. Will the Mayor of London's promise be carried out or will there simply be new efforts to hide them out of sight?