http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b070jqms/professor-green-hidden-and-homeless
I found this BBC documentary which is presented by Professor Green who 'sets out to discover the modern face of homelessness' and wants to change 'our perceptions of who the homeless are and the harsh reality of their lives'.
He wanted to produce a documentary that looks at the people who aren't classed as homeless but who still are, such sofa surfers or those who live in hostels. The only people who are classed as homeless on the government statistics are those who can be visibly seen to be sleeping rough on one night a year when they walk around a city and count them. If these people are in tents or even sleeping in bins or the like they will not be counted as homeless on the statistics. This is why the statistics always look better than the reality of the situation. Its troubling to think that the people who live in the Piccadilly camp in Manchester won't be counted in the homeless statistics if they aren't seen on the one day a year the council come round to check.
He discovered how difficult life actually is for homeless people by following people's day to day lives such as 21 year old Luke who had to turn to a new drug called spice to get him through the nights he used to spend sleeping rough. Luke is now in a hostel but still addicted to the drug.
Professor Green commented saying " People on the street are often not looked at as humans, it was something I wanted to understand". This quote about not being look at as humans relates closely to what I'm trying to showcase through my photographic project.
He went onto saying, "A lot of people end up on the street and then suffer mental health issues. People are groomed, there's prostitution, drugs", "They're constantly on the move to get what little help they can. Most of the help they do get doesn't come from the authorities, it comes from charities". These two points are something that I would like to develop into my project, focusing my work onto the help that is out there for people who need it the most. And the drug problems are something that I have touched upon in the past including alcohol and other substances, but I have seen first hand that there are much worse drugs that are being used than alcohol on an everyday bases. While I was speaking to Pete at the last shoot he told me about other people in the camp that are using heroin everyday and that it can make people do some crazy things.
For my next development, it would be interesting to try and photograph a tent interior of someone who uses these types of drugs. Even though this isn't the story I want to tell through my work, it is intrinsically linked to homelessness and how some people are dealing with life on the streets. I will have to be very careful about putting myself in harms way, but I feel like its an important angle for me to document and one that shows the struggles and spiral of decline some homeless people find themselves within. This angle would also contrast how Pete and his girlfriend manage to live on the streets, while focusing on the same type of homeless life inside a tent.