Number of rough sleepers in London 2013-2020, by gender

In 2019/20, over 8.8 thousand men were reported to be sleeping homeless in London with a further 1.75 thousand women, and two non-binary people. Since 2010/11 there has been an increase in the amount of people reported to be sleeping rough in London, increasing from almost 4 thousand in 2010/11 to 8.1 thousand by 2016/17. While this figure fell to 7.48 thousand in 2017/18, this is clearly an unacceptable situation for one of the world’s richest cities as figures reached 10.72 thousand in 2019/20.

Characteristics of homeless people in London

Of the rough sleepers seen in London in 2019/20, the most common age group were those aged between 36 and 45, which accounted for 32 percent of all rough sleepers. In terms of nationality, most rough sleepers were from the United Kingdom at 4.68 thousand people, but there were also over 2 thousand from Central and Eastern European countries

Tragic implications of homelessness

In 2019, 144 homeless people in London lost their lives, which was the highest number of homeless deaths per region in England and Wales. In terms of the homeless death rate, the worst region for was the South West of England, which had 26.9 deaths per million people in 2019. North West had the second highest deaths per million population at 23.3. .