Innholdsfortegnelse for 3/31/2025 i The Big Issue

Big Issue revealed in November 2023 that the number of people who had been left homeless after leaving asylum accommodation tripled as the Home Office’s policy change took hold. Our investigation found almost 1,500 refugees were assessed as homeless between August and October, up from 450 in the same period last year. We also found evidence that the UK’s biggest cities were bracing themselves for 6,900 people to be made homeless by the end of 2023. In the fourth quarter of 2023, the Home Office made 46,572 initial decisions and withdrawals on asylum claims, far exceeding the 27,613 in the previous quarter and the 13,264 in the three months before that, according to analysis from The Migration Observatory. Big Issue was the first to reveal a Home Office U-turn on…

How do you convert a handout into a hand up? With great difficulty. That £10 that you gave to a beggar may actually change their lives. But mostly it will go into the day-to-day expenditure of being poor and in immediate need. Likewise with social security offered by an increasingly challenged state – challenged by increases in need – it will not lift you anywhere new. It won’t transform you to a position that enables you to exit the dimensions of poverty. That doesn’t mean that social security cannot be curative. It can enable you to do things that can perfect skills that take you places. The actor Michael Caine reminds people on TV chat shows of the power of the ‘dole’. How at times he would see the future…

The foster care system is under immense pressure. And we know this is having a detrimental impact on children and families. Our 2024 State of the Nation’s Foster Care report paints a stark picture – burnout, financial strain and a lack of recognition are driving many foster carers to consider leaving altogether. Without urgent action, we risk losing even more foster carers, making it increasingly difficult to provide stability for children in care. However, with key legislation and policy changes on children’s social care happening across the UK, the government has a critical opportunity to implement meaningful reforms. Foster carers must be valued, supported, and financially secure so that every child has the home and care they deserve. We have outlined a series of recommendations to ensure fostering provision is…

LIVING ON THE EDGE: How to avoid falling into poverty amid rising costs Am I eligible for benefits? As the government makes plans to slash the benefits bill, the DWP estimates that over £22 billion went unclaimed in 2024, meaning many people are going without support they are entitled to. Halide Kalfaoglu, benefits expert at Turn2us, told Big Issue: “Start by checking you’re receiving all the benefits you’re entitled to. Social security exists to support people when their circumstances change, such as losing a job, developing a health condition, facing an increase in rent or having a child.” Simon Trevethick, head of communications for StepChange, said the charity sees “time and time again that people aren’t taking advantage of all the help available to them”, adding that a tool on StepChange’s…

Bowie’s death had a profound impact on me. I needed to celebrate his life. But how, exactly? I’d lost a companion and guide from those teenage years. Bowie, the brother I never had, the figure brave enough to follow his dreams, whatever the price. What was I going to do about it? Above all, I felt a compulsion to get out there and make Bowie my own. The eventual solution was random, a matter of impulse, certainly not logic. But then things fell into place and an initial gesture of homage turned into an ongoing call to action. The answer? It was simple. Walk. I’d watched coverage of vigils at Bowie shrines around the world. Weeping fans, messages, mounds of flowers. The closest of these to me were in Beckenham,…

When you migrate from one socioeconomic status to another, you spot subtle signs of class struggle everywhere. Perhaps nowhere more so than on dog walks. Going up the park with my idiotic cockapoo, Cookie, is supposed to be relaxing. But since the middle classes started getting into dogs (it all took off in lockdown), it has just become irritating. I live in a posh area, where most people own dogs for the same reason they own Volvos or BMWs: it’s a lifestyle accoutrement. They have introduced a load of pointless codes of conduct and, in the process, sucked the joy out of it. When I was a kid, we owned a mongrel called Bella. She was bought on a whim one day because we happened to be passing Battersea Dogs’…

HOUSING CRISIS How fixing up forgotten churches can make a divine intervention in the housing crisis The UK has officially moved to a more secular society and losing our religion has left a number of churches and faith-owned spaces lying empty. Could these unused properties offer a solution to the housing crisis? That’s the question researchers at the Welsh think tank the Bevan Foundation asked, alongside Housing Justice Cymru. They found an estimated 7,000 homes could be created either by redeveloping unused places of worship and associated buildings or releasing faith-owned land holdings. The Welsh government is targeting building 20,000 new social rent homes by 2026 and the idea could offer a quick fix to tackling a housing crisis. But there are challenges to overcome, Wendy Dearden, senior policy and…

It comes back to Rod Stewart, as things inevitably do. Or should. Many aspects of the life we live have a Rod-shaped element. Take football. Think of knockout competitions and you will think of Rod, a little jolly following a Celtic victory, drawing teams live on TV for the fifth round of the Scottish Cup, in early 2017. We’re eight years on and few moments in football have bettered that. If you’re not familiar, go and watch it now. Then, let’s look at local authority funding and deficits, and we’ll move quickly to Rod. Last week, Keir Starmer announced a punitive measure that laid out how central government in England would hold back a certain level of funding to local authorities if those authorities didn’t provide evidence of pothole repairs.…

Wait a minute, what do you mean? I’ve never done an interview with a title. This interview is called Letter To My – I’m writing it down – To My Younger Self. Hey, I’m already stimulated. At 16 I was already a complicated and sensitive fellow. This is the late ’60s. It was a wild adventure. There was something transcendental, transformational, transmogrifying in the air. What would I say to that fella? I’d say, Kid, don’t miss a thing. It’s all going as it should, as it has to. The universe is a wondrous, mysterious place and you’re a part of it. Appreciate it. Be grateful. Be present, as we like to say nowadays. Don’t miss a second of the pain, the confusion, the ecstasy and the people in your…

One of our vendors Brad, who sells the magazine in Hackney, East London, wanted to share a poem with Big Issue readers. He said: “It encapsulates my life’s journey in just a few verses: family rejection, a brutal state care system, resilience, the pathway to healing and hope of a brighter future.” The System’s Child, Now Rising High Brad, a name etchedon a faded file, A life adrift, lost for a while. Born to a mother,a love unfulfilled, A cradle of neglect,a promise unsealed. The system’s embrace,a cold, sterile hand, Where shadows of sorrowforever expand. Bruises unseen,scars that reside, In the depths of his soul,where emotions reside. But within him,a spirit so strong, Refusing to falter,where he belonged. A flicker of hope,a yearning to rise, To break through the darkness,and…

Express Collaborations is a group exhibition built over many months and devised by artist Tanya Raabe-Webber. It was made with support from Project Ability, a Glasgow-based charity working with people with learning disabilities and mental ill-health to promote inclusive art for all. Raabe-Webber’s idea was to bring a large group of local and international artists together, mostly online, where they discussed and made artwork in response to themes chosen by one another. Reaching as far as Australia and Sweden, the artists took turns leading online workshops, sharing their chosen theme and why it inspired them. Each artist then responded to this theme by making an artwork. Some of the themes included ‘What’s your fairytale?’, ‘Childhood’ and ‘Embodied Drawing’. The artwork featured, by Sarah Watson, is an example from the latter…

“It’s kind of you to spend your time listening,” is the first thing Alabaster DePlume says on receipt of my questions for this piece. He is on tour in the US, promoting his new album A Blade Because a Blade is Whole, and his gratitude seems overgenerous – this album feels like a carefully wrapped, thoughtfully chosen gift, graciously bestowed at just the right moment. Those already familiar with his work will recognise the breathy, earthy sound of his saxophone, still present on this record but couched in a richer, more communal atmosphere. I ask him if this description resonates and his response is equally unassuming: “If there is a communal aspect to the record it is most likely more a tendency, I mean a handy way to do the…

BRYAN BINYON, 56 I’ve only been selling the magazine for about a month and it’s been really good so far. I’ve been talking to people and they’ve been asking me if I knew about the shipyards here and I’ve been telling them a bit of history from what I can remember. I started selling the magazine because I’ve known people who were homeless and I’ve been homeless myself and I wanted to try and explain to the public what it’s like. I want to explain how Big Issue works and how it helps some people to get into accommodation and jobs. People have been really interested in that. I enjoy that social side. I’ve got a few regular customers and they look out for me. If I’m not there, they…

Get in touch The Big Issue, 2nd floor, 43 Bath Street, Glasgow G2 1HW letters@bigissue.com @bigissueuk @bigissue.com @bigissue /bigissueUK @thebigissue Dream on I was just reading this morning on my news app: The Sun news says: ‘Millions on benefits can STILL get top-of-the-range BMWs & Ford Mustangs worth over £50k despite Labour’s welfare cuts’. This makes me so angry, making out disabled people are living the dream. In this article it does not mention that if you do choose a really expensive car then you have to pay thousands towards it and then pay monthly with the payments from PIP. There are also cheaper cars with no deposit but people still pay for it out of the PIP money like a lease. You can’t get a second-hand car on disability…

Yoko Ono is a revolutionary conceptual artist, peace activist, feminist icon and musician whose work has inspired generations. She’s also one of the most unfairly vilified public figures in living memory, a woman who was forced to endure vile torrents of racist and sexist abuse for the alleged crime of breaking up The Beatles. These days, only an ignorant minority of people (mostly men) still cling to that opinion, but the rehabilitation of Ono as an important and respected artist in her own right was a long time coming. David Sheff ’s Yoko crowns that process. It studies her life and work in the depth it deserves while authoritatively dismantling falsehoods. You’ll have renewed admiration for this often-misunderstood human being. Sheff and Ono became close friends after he interviewed her…

Just as Black Country, New Road released their second album, 2022’s Ants From Up There, they announced that singer and guitarist Isaac Wood was leaving the band, shrinking their number from seven to six. Wood was open about the reasons for leaving, notably how a “sad and afraid feeling” was making it impossible for him to perform. The parting was amicable but left the rest of the band in a quandary, forcing them to cancel all live dates except a single show at London’s Roundhouse. They issued the stopgap Live At Bush Hall album in 2023 as they recalibrated and worked on reinventing what they could sound like. “It wouldn’t have felt appropriate to get someone else to sing Isaac’s parts,” says Georgia Ellery, violin and vocals in the band…

What was the biggest defining event of your youth? Jumping on stage at the age of 17 to do stand-up. I was really young and didn’t know myself at all, but I knew I had a gift and wanted to make people laugh. What were your big influences? The moment I watched Eddie Murphy’s Delirious comedy hour on VHS (showing my age!) I knew exactly what I wanted to do for a living. Coming to America will always be the funniest film I’ve watched. It’s a timeless classic! It also made me feel proud of being African. What is your big idea to save the world? Laughter. Laughter heals everything. Who was the biggest artist for you growing up? Growing up, Eminem was definitely the biggest artist around. My Name…