Homelessness In Portsmouth

THURSDAY 26^TH JANUARY. Another quiet evening but we did see JAMIE, CHRIS, TINNY, SEAN and MAC

This evening I took out a young lady named Courtney, her mum is a carer at Echoes, the company I work for and she asked if her daughter could come out with me as she needs to do some volunteer work to help her achieve her duke of Edinburgh award. I didn’t mind her coming out but I was worried about her age as she is only 14, so I asked my son Lewis if he could come out with us, just as a precaution in case we come across any strange behaviour on our round.

We picked Lewis up on our way to the seafront, he only lives in Fratton so it wasn’t going out of my way. Our first stop was to see if there was any sign of Phil and Mark but agin there wasn’t, we stopped at the war memorial but never walked around it, just called out for Phil and Mark by the road side, but no one there. We went along to see Tinny, Chris and Jamie and introduced them to Lewis and Courtney. They were very polite as usual and made Courtney and Lewis feel at ease. Lewis and Courtney weren’t sure on what to expect when they came out with me but they were surprised at how nice these people are, Courtney said that they are just normal people like us but with no home, she really enjoyed herself. Lewis asked Jamie if he would like another guitar as he has one in doors that he no longer needs, Jamie of course accepted as his guitar has seen better days. I told him I’d bring it to him on Tuesday.

When we finished at the hard I took them both to Osborne road to meet Mac, he introduced himself and shook hands with them both. Mac told me that he had his drug test today and it came back clear, he was so proud of himself and so am I proud of him, it takes a lot to come off drugs, especially in the poor living conditions he is in. We gave Mac soup and rolls etc then went to see if Paul was about but he wasn’t so we went to Albert road to see Sean. I introduced Courtney to Sean and explained why she was with me tonight. Sean was now selling the big issue again so that he can stay in his spot without getting moved on. If you sell the big issue in big issue marked spots then you can’t get moved on by the police, council or wardens.

We fed Sean and gave him underwear etc then drove around but found no one else about so I dropped Lewis home and then Courtney and then I went home myself.