Seen a chap, spoken to him on a couple of occasions, out on the streets, stop pass the time of day, that sort of thing, he’s not asked me for cash, would you give him some if he asked you?

I’m more inclined to buy them a burger or something but I do give the odd quid here & there

about 20 mins ago i was walking down oxford street. passed a guy who was getting “empty” drinks cups out of the bin, decanting them into a cup and the drinking the lot. i figured i’d get him a bottle of water, so went and did so. caught him up, handed it to him and said, “here you go mate, i got you this.” he replied, “no thanks, i don’t like water,” and walked off… 😕

i now have the bottle of water sat on my desk and don’t know whether to feel patronising or just confused 😆

NO! If you have to ‘give it to the homeless’ then give it to a charity that will assist them off the street.

On street cash donations = funds for whatever keeps them there in the first place.

tankslapper – Member
NO! If you have to ‘give it to the homeless’ then give it to a charity that will assist them off the street.

On street cash donations = funds for whatever keeps them there in the first place.

+1

No harm in buying a cuppa on a cold day, or a bottle of water as mentioned above, but cash on the street ain’t going to help the situation.

I give them food soetimes. There is often someone ( different folk) outside a shop I use that has prepack sandwhiches. I ask are you hungry? and if so give them a sandwich.

you have to give to an organised charity sadly street begging funds the lifestyle (drugs,alcohol,cigarettes) and is unliley to move the person forwards to something positive unless you think they are saving for a deposit.

I offered to go and buy a homeless bloke some food, he said he needed to ask his missus what she wanted could he just have the money….I waved a tenner at him and told him he’s not in the position to be so choosey, therefore he’ll not be having this note, so i went and got myself a big pizza and scoffed it in front of him.

He wasn’t too grateful, but it made my evening more enjoyable.

I never give them anything, more out of the fact that I rarely have more than a few pence change in my wallet and its zipped in my wallet and not easy to get to. If they ask for it they wont get it as I dont like being pestered while doing things (I rarely venture into town without a mission). My other half is more pleasant, she used to buy a homeless chap a cup of coffee each morning at work, he was apparently very grateful.

Theres a blind chap who whistles tunes in Stafford Town Centre … I usually give to him cos he is genuine…
But, and I could be wrong, some types dress for it and appear rehearsed kinda thing..

How much cash are we talking about?

As far as I’m concerned, while saying “good evening sir” and giving someone a tenner isn’t going to solve their problems it isn’t necessarily going to ruin them either.

I understand the point of giving someone food rather than money, but it does rather say “I don’t trust you not to spend any money you get on smack”, which is not a nice thing to tell someone.

In any case, I spend a large amount of my disposable income on whoring and boozing. I would be extremely annoyed if my employer started paying me in nutritious food and cheques made payable to my mortgage company, although it would clearly be good for me.

Not trying to be flippant, but self respect must be difficult to come by for those guys, and that may not be helped by everyone not giving them money “for their own good”.

You are raising interesting point BD.
I never gave the money, the odd baguette or water bottle from time to time but no money.

Give money to charities as they’ll hopefully use your money more effectively – some are obviously more efficient than others though.

Giving them food instead of money would be perfectly well received by the sensible and thoughtful ones, those who find it offensive to their sensibilities are likely the ones who can’t see why people would not trust them in the first place. I’m not giving my hard-earned readies to someone to blow on booze, thats for me to do. If I give MY money away, I want it to help them stay warm/fed, not boozed up.

Giving to charities seems like a good way of wasting 50% of what you give away.

I usually give the big issue guy a quid more than the cost when I buy it.

As a police officer in a large urban area I’ve spoken to numerous homeless people and professional beggars. Most people who beg use the money they earn to fund either drink or drug habits. However there are also quite a few professional beggars who earn quite staggering amounts by pretending to be poor.

One lad I used to speak to on an almost daily basis would beg for a few hours each morning until he earnt enough to fund his heroin habit. He said he could easily clear £80 in a morning. That is until his girlfriend died of an overdose and I helped put him in touch with St Mungos and he cleaned himself up.

That’s obviously in between tazering random innocent members of the public, bullying ethnic minorities and doing everything in my power to avoid doing something important like catching paedophiles.

I would suggest giving any money to Shelter or St Mungos.

Giving to the charities is all well & good but most people aren’t that organised to do that – it tends to be a reaction to a request

if there was a guy sat there with his cup & a charity worker next to him shaking a tin, I may may the decision in the tins favours but I think the odd quid or bit of food helps them to get though the day

I flip from rabid Tory to yoghurt knitting liberal and back again on this one.

As above, giving beggars cash is a bad idea, they spend it on booze and smack. Loads of people do give them cash and it drives me up the wall.

….but where’s your empathy McBoo????? Scarily about 1/3 of homeless in London are ex-servicemen (like me) and I can see exactly how they’ve ended up there.

There are professional beggers around liverpool, pretending to have lost their wallet or pretending to be homeless. If you sit in the coffee shop you can see them walking around all morning, then going and changing the cash for notes in the shops. Trust no-one.

That’s obviously in between tazering random innocent members of the public,

Well, there has to be some perks to the job…. 😉

I totally understand the ‘don’t give money, just food’ argument and it’s probably very noble in intention but I must admit I do give money to homeless people (I give to charities too) on the street. I suppose I have the notion of ‘whatever gets you through the night’. I suppose a committed alchoholic/ drug user, living a pretty dire life on the streets has to find some comfort somewhere and I may be perpetuating their lifestyle (as if it’s chosen!) but hopefully am funding an escape route as well via charitable giving etc.

I don’t feel right giving money, but also can’t really see a viable alternative.

Work or starve….

I don’t feel right giving money, but also can’t really see a viable alternative.

Walk away? You dont have to give money, if you dont feel right doing it it probably isnt right.

Coffeeking

Giving to charities seems like a good way of wasting 50% of what you give away.

I’m interested coffeeking, what are you basing this assertion on?

I gave all my remaining euro-smash to a beggar in Venice last week. Then found my bus ticket was only one way so had to buy one back to the airport. If I’d still had one euro I needn’t have broke the E50 note which was waiting to be exchanged back to sterling. Bummed.

Should I have given him the 50 note maybe?

Not anymore. A few years ago I got to know a bloke who lived on the streets. He seemed a decent fella and didn’t look like he was on the gear. There came a time where he got a job (temporary) and said that it was his chance to get off the streets. A couple of weeks later, he looked a lot cleaner and I genuinely believe that he was actually working and he’s got himself a bedsit.

Maybe I’m a sucker for a sob story, but one evening whilst chatting, he told me that he didn’t get paid for a few days and was already behind with his rent. Long story short, I lent him some money – and he was very aware that it was a loan – to help tide him through a few days and keep his bedsit and therefore, job. We agreed that he would pay me back at £5 per week for a good few weeks. Did he ever pay me a penny – did he ****!

I know that you should never generalise, but because of him, I will never give money to anyone like that again. What made me particularly mad about it was that I could have spent that money on my kids!

crisped- the fact taht to run a charity you need admin costs, building costs etc etc covered. These things cost. There have been NUMEROUS cases in the past few years where as little as 10% of donated cash went to the cause.

coffeking you are a grumpy old bugger.

I give cash; if i was on the street i’d want some money and if i wanted to fritter it away on booze/ skag/ a cup of tea/ jelly babies that’s what i’d do with it.

Just cos they’ve got no money – doesn’t mean they can spend it on crap like the rest of us

I give cash; if i was on the street i’d want some money and if i wanted to fritter it away on booze/ skag/ a cup of tea/ jelly babies that’s what i’d do with it.

that goes against what Shelter recommend, and I assume they know more about what’s helpful than we do.

I do not want to insinuate that anyone at Shelter has any vested interest whatsoever in me giving my money to them, but I will not be nagged by the gigantic morass of the Professional Helpful. 🙂

that goes against what Shelter recommend

Do they recommend giving your cash to them?!

As for the efficiency of Charities – if you give them money with gift aid that will cover the admin loss of the better ones. Though that means less tax for the government and they need every penny these days!

Whatever, the big Charities, and may small ones as well, are better placed to spend your money sensibly if you want to donate some than anyone else. Indeed for most good causes that’s the only way to do it.

yeah i realised after i wrote that that it obviously suggests that shelter would have a vested interest in you giving your money to them instead. i’m sure it’s the general advice from all such organisations but i can’t be bothered to look it up.

I used to work near Waterloo Station and there was a regular crowd of homeless in a little open area just across from the Old Vic theatre. Usually pissed off their heads at all hours of the day and night. Anyway, I was in the local corner shop one day and one of these beggars walked in, picked up 4 6-packs of Special Brew, then pulled a wad of cash out of his pocket to pay for it. Loads of £20’s all neatly wrapped up. He had more money in his pocket than I had in my bank account (I was a poor student at the time…)

Result: no I would never give them any money.

Big Dummy – Many companies used to pay their workforces in vouchers only redeemable against adulterated and overpriced food in the company shops.

The practice was rightfully stamped out, but we’re talking about handouts here not wages.

I’ll give money to a homeless person if I like the cut of their jib, but most often I walk past tbh.

But when I do put my hand in my pocket, if somebody’s spending the night on the street and wants to put my quid or two towards a nice bit of smack to keep them warm then I don’t really begrudge them that.

Maybe give them a can of food for their dog. Been brutally honest, I wont give anything to anyone on the street. I work hard enough for every penny I have, charity starts at home.

Coffeking – some charities are very innefficient but most are not.

I sometimes give money to someone who has a good story – not because I believe the story but because it entertains me. Mind you the chap who approched me with the – “I have just run out of petrol and I need to get back to stirling to look after my kids as they get out of school but have no cash” didn’t get anything the second or third time he approached me.

My fave was the chap who showed me a quid or so in change and told me he just needed 50p so he could get a can of crucial brew 🙂

I gave someone £15 for a taxi to the airport once as he was stranded at my local tube station. A while later he approached me at Waterloo but seemed to recognize me and turned away.

Not sure what to say about Gingerbloke though others think the same way. Can’t slag off the likes of Thatcher and be like that IMO – either we care about society or we don’t.

Coffeking – I suppose I see giving cash as the lesser of two evils, just walking away being the more evil option. I suppose it all depends on your view of “the homeless” – either as sponging, work shy lay abouts or as fellow human beings with circumstances less benevolent than my own. I am quite sure there are thieves and liars out there but tarring all vulnerable people with the same brush can’t be the way forward.

I think I may be a hand wringing liberal, feeling a little impotent in the face of gross social inequality and making token gestures but I’d rather that than ignore a fellow human in need – plus I guess I don’t want to be a miserable s0d devoid of emotion a la scrooge 😀

So you won’t give money to beggars on the street, but when fake ones pop up on the internet its fine!

http://www.singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/help-anyone

I don’t give any beggars money, I figure most just need the will to help themselves

I give money to people on the street all the time,only a quid or two or whatever change I have.Some might be profesional beggars,but most will be homeless with a drink or drug problem. Why because I have something and they have nothing.Its not for me to moralise over how they spend it.