Professor John Middleton, Vice President of the Global Network for Academic Public Health and a Global Law Enforcement and Public Health Association (GLEPHA) Fellow, presented evidence to the meeting of the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to adequate housing, Mr Rajagopal, and the UN Special Rapporteur on poverty and human rights, Olivier De Schutter, on April 2nd, 2024. GNAPH is pleased to reproduce this statement here, with permission of the UN Rapporteurs’ Secretariat. Their full report is due to be published early in July 2024.
Professor Middleton’s intervention led to a further opinion piece in the British Medical Journal, with Professor Alex Bax, Chief Executive of the UK Pathway, the UK Healthcare for homeless people charity:
Bax A, Middleton J. Homelessness is a health emergency: criminalising homeless people will only make it worse BMJ 2024;385:q1165. http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmj.q1165
We reproduce Professor Middleton’s evidence here.
It remains GNAPH’s view that there is no evidence for criminalisation of social and societal problems. Collaborative interventions between health, policing, social welfare and housing authorities are needed to address problems of exclusion, vulnerability, homelessness, poverty, addictions, mental and physical disability.