The flurry of social media concerns about homeless people on the Streets near where Princess Eugenie and her fiancé will get married reminds me of two conversations that took place in Brighton and Hove several years ago. When David Panter was CEO of the City Council, I was in the office of someone who worked for the Government but was based in the City Council Offices when the Labour Government was attempting to deal with the issues that the Tories are now promising they will sort out by 2027. Whilst we were discussing various matters, David rang the person I was visiting. David had just cycled into work and passed the Brighton Centre and was upset that there were several people sleeping in the doorway of the building. The person I was with said very calmly that if David wished to avoid such sights, he would need to choose an alternative route into work in the future!

A couple of years later when the Labour Party where due to come to Brighton to hold their annual conference in the Brighton Centre, there was a meeting which I chaired that involved a senior member of Sussex Police explaining to a diverse group of people what the plans they had in mind were. Because of the terrorist threats to the Government the plan was to surround the building and indeed nearby Hotels and other buildings with concrete barriers and steel protective walls and that only people who were booked to come into conference would be able to get inside the space. They explained that in a few weeks time they would need to move the homeless people on until after the conference was over. Someone in the meeting who worked for a charity that provides support for homeless people spoke up and suggested that the Police visit her charity in the period before they needed to move the people on and explain to them in a sensitive way what was about to occur and why and give them a chance to find alternative places to gather in the evenings. In an ideal world such conversations would go beyond simply don’t sleep in the Centre doorway for the next few weeks, and instead focus on what could be done to help the same people in the long term. In due course in our city that approach did come about with a project called Shore that involved agencies such as the NHS, Police, Local Authorities and Housing Charities in an attempt to help the people who at the time were sleeping on our Streets.

Of course asking Windsor Council to take one of these two approaches is perhaps unrealistic, but it might be worth considering in advance of the next Royal Wedding!