#BTEditorial – Homeless people in Parliament’s face

Though there may be dynamics at play impacting the trajectory of a person’s life, we often judge a family by how it treats its elderly, and at the national level, we make that assessment based on how a country treats its poor.

When faced with increasing levels of poverty, while at the same time advantaged groups of people in a country continue to excel and enjoy all the trappings of a good life, they often revert to the phrase “the poor will always be with us”.

We regard such comments as an excuse for not making adequate and meaningful provision for those who genuinely cannot take care of themselves.

In a country like ours that has developed out of a history of plantocracy and slavery, it is expected that there will be many among us who have not been able to pull themselves up by their bootstraps.

Yes. Barbados has made significant strides in education and social provisioning, ensuring that if upward mobility cannot be achieved through inheritance or access because of one’s race, then it must be achieved through education.

The fact that in 2023, with all the challenges that a small island developing state faces including climate change, and limited access to low interest financing, we can still provide free education for our youth from nursery to university, is an enormous feat.

In the United States of America for example, some state officials and members of the Republican party have objected to President Joe Biden’s proposal to relieve the debt burden being carried by millions of mainly poor and black students.

One law firm seeking to help students caught in the middle of the legal battles to stall the Federal Student Loan Debt Relief 2022 legislation, assessed the system of financing higher education in that country as broken.

They noted that millions of Americans were burdened by unaffordable debt that further stymied their financial future. In some cases, the student borrowers were defrauded by predatory for-profit schools, resulting in them incurring massive debt but no job prospects.

In Barbados, we have saved many people from being saddled with such an unfortunate situation as they try to establish their adult lives.

Despite our successes at elevation through education and our significant investment in an impressive social safety net, we are still battling what is becoming an embarrassing rise in homelessness in the country.

As we have seen in some neighbouring islands, the homeless are showing up in the capital city where feeding programmes and foot traffic are likely to increase their chances of success at begging alms.

Unfortunately, the area where more homeless are congregating puts them less than 50 yards away from our historic Parliament Buildings where they cannot be ignored.

The homeless who hang their belongings and pitch tent on the grounds of the abandoned Treasury Building, seem to be pre-empting the Government’s plan to make the iconic Bridgetown structure, a new spot for those who like the excitement of City life.

It may have been funny when well-known street character Ninja Man with all his antics and strange collections, was the lone occupant of the grounds. Now, we have a community of homeless dwellers on the spot, using the fountain to shower and wash their clothes.

We were pleased to learn from Member of Parliament for The City and Minister of State in the Attorney General’s Office Corey Lane that some short-term measures were being formulated to address the issue. We wish him well. He is a man who now has a significant portfolio and a constituency with enormous needs.

“Like most complex social problems, we have to take a multifaceted approach, so research has been done, housing has been done. In some cases, psychiatric and social care has been done. We’ve reached out to a number of the organisations dealing with the homeless,” Lane was quoted in the local media.

Today, many families are fractured, while the problem of drug abuse, particularly marijuana, is adding to the pressures that many people are already confronting from the last two years of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The rising number of young women on the streets is also a cause for concern, as with women, you are likely to have children also.

Homelessness is not an easily fixed matter. However, we will be judged harshly as a nation if the issue gets worse than it has already become.