THE LIFE OF
BRIAN
The
Sunday Times (London) December 28 1986
BRIAN Bannister is 17 and will get by just fine
without Crisis at Christmas, the once-a-year charity
group that closes tomorrow, writes Brian Deer.
After nine months in London sleeping rough, even the
luxuries of an indoor matress and as much hot tea as
he can drink have not dented his street resiliance.
Bannister
left home in Sheffield last spring to find portering
work in the south, but has proved to be such an
awkward person that he has been unable to find a
home. After being banned from Salvation Army and
other London hostels, he has slept in doorways, under
bridges and on building sites.
He
has remained well-fed, spending much of his
£29.40-a-week "no fixed abode" social
security giro on junk food and chips. Wearing a clean
jacket and jumper, he could easily have passed
unnoticed yesterday as anybody's teenage son.
His
few nights at the temporary Crisis centre in south
London, however, were a welcome Christmas break. He
suffers from epilepsy, which could be watched over by
the centre's volunteers. And its no-alcohol admission
policy kept him away from "Jack", a
powerful cocktail of cider, milk and metholated
spirit he has lately been drawn towards.
But
Bannister is not going back onto the streets quietly.
Over the last three days, he has been collecting
names for a petition which he wants to give in at
Downing Street, calling for more houses to be built
for the homeless - although centre volunteers tried
to ban him from doing so.
"I
want to get this through to Mrs Thatcher and Prince
Charles," he says, proudly holding up a tatty
folded poster on which fellow street people have
written their names. "And I want to give it to
Bob Geldof and, what-do-you-call-him, Neil Kinnock,
as well."
Brian
also has a more ambitious plan for when the Crisis
centre shuts. Instead of the hundreds of homeless
people who have slept there in the last few days
meekly dispersing, he wants them to join together,
take their mattresses and follow him across the
nearby Old Kent Road to renovate and occupy one of
the derelict factories he has found.
His
effort is unlikely to succeed, but his spirit has won
him support. "We think this sort of thing is
terrific," says Leighton Andrews, the UK
organiser of the 1987 international year of shelter
for the homeless. "People doing things for
themselves is the message everywhere."
| brian deer |
Copyright,
Times Newspapers Ltd. All rights reserved. No portion
of this article on a crisis after Christmas may be
copied, retransmitted, reposted, duplicated or
otherwise used without the express written approval
of the copyright owner. Responses, information and
other feedback are appreciated - via Brian Deer's
homepage.
