Barbican security guard calls the City of London Police to have us removed, and I am threatened with an arrest on the trumped-up charge of assaulting a police officer

This is where we had been sleeping since the West London Churches Homeless Concern (WLCHC) closed their winter shelters on 13 April. It was relatively safe, we didn't bother anyone, and Declan's asthma and chest infection could have been kept under control (from the Royal London Hospital's Discharge Summary of 16 April: "Diagnosed with asthma and a concurrent chest infection on 14th April at first attendance to Charing Cross Hospital").



Last night a Barbican security guard called the police as we were bedding down and PC 667CP and PC 602CP from Bishopsgate Police Station were on us in minutes. They threatened to dump our belongings on the pavement if we didn’t move on immediately, which then became they were going to come around later with street cleaners to have us hosed out, and which then became two female officers were going to arrest me later on the trumped-up charge of assaulting a police officer. (I immediately thought of an article I read a couple of weeks ago about a gang of Romanian rough sleepers who had been terrorising residents, tourists and shopkeepers for two years around Marble Arch, one of the capital’s best known and most central landmarks, because the police could do nothing about them.) We eventually decided to spend the night in King’s Cross train station rather than risk my arrest on such a trumped-up charge, and today we have decided that we have no choice now but to spend our nights sleeping on night buses until the Single Homeless Project come through with their offer of a flat, first tabled on 21 January.



This is Declan last week just after he was diagnosed with ashma and a chest infection:


The surprise in all this is that today we are supposed to hear from a Single Homeless Project caseworker with an appointment to view a housing association flat. Still no word on that one!

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And so much for "alternative remedies" to prevent us from becoming street homeless again when WLCHC closed their doors the week before last:

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From My Picks:

12 July 2019: Threat to life: Updated complaint to the United Nations under Article 19 (freedom of expression) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Mayor of London-commissioned St Mungo's highlighted

'Let me recommend an important web site churchandstate.org.uk. Operating out of London this well-designed and exciting web site covers church-state, population, climate change and other issues. Check it out.' Edd Doerr, President, Americans for Religious Liberty

We are very concerned about what is going to happen to us in the Barbican tonight

This is a follow-up from the previous blog, "Hospital refuses to put in writing that Declan was diagnosed on 14 April with asthma and a chest infection":

33.     Both the applicant and his wife are deeply concerned that the accommodation blockade through surveillance that they have experienced in London and in Brighton for near on two years has now been extended to beyond the close of the WLCHC winter night shelters on 13 April 2014; especially, since the applicant has been diagnosed with asthma, which is a chronic, or life long, disease that can be serious – even life threatening. They have been threatened with hosings by street cleaners, serious assault and/or incarceration for rough sleeping in the Barbican estate, which is owned by the City of London (public property), for want of a place to safely sleep following the fencing off of their previous sleeping pitch in December 2013. For example, on 31 December, before the WLCHC night shelters opened, someone ran a bucket of water across a stairs above their heads as soon as they had bedded down. The following is an extract from the N4CM blog of 1 January 2014 under the title, “Declan calls into Bishopsgate Police Station for a crime intel report”:

We are concerned about what’s on the menu for tonight, so this morning we went to Bishopsgate Police Station where I showed PC 960CP all the photos I had taken. According to this police officer, there was no crime because the drenching could have been done by City of London street cleaners. In fact, he added, we should expect them every night from now on. He found our situation so hilarious that Declan told him as we were leaving that I would mention it in my blog, to which he replied, “Please do.”

So much for "alternative remedies" to prevent us from becoming street homeless again on 14 April:

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