Careful!

1 Earlier today, as I and a colleague, sat in the landlady's front room - a tidy front room - we wove an Undeserving scarf, one which we then wrapped round the client. He had told her he had been working (in Thailand as a teacher of English). She didn't take clients who were on benefits. Last Friday morning, so she told us, he had offered her £35 for the room when he had told me that the night's rent would be £45. His small room was untidy. He had asked if he could sit in the garden; no, he couldn't. He had steamed open a letter from me to her. (Meanwhile, she had taken a letter addressed to him, one which also carried a SSAFA sticker. He had a laptop computer in his room. We listened and drank our tea and coffee in the tidy front room.

1.1 Later, he and a friend were in the nearby Waitrose cafe when we were there. Before we left, I went over and said Hello to him and to his friend, and I wished him well at an interview which, he told us, will be held in Midhurst tomorrow. We didn't tell him what we had agreed with the landlady, namely, that his stay in the boarding house - no breakfasts, except for him - would cease on the agreed date, 6 June.

1.2 I sense that he is beyond our reach. He is homeless. He is presently living in a small room. He is receiving benefits. There was no indication that he had claimed Housing benefit. But my colleague takes the view that we cannot rely on what he says. The landlady is uneasy. At present, I cannot continue. The case of the 50-year-old man who is homeless can be told only as it develops. Look out for continuations.

2 In the meantime though I must be careful. It is easy to label someone, in this instance, as undeserving. Even if the label is (sufficiently) well founded to attach it to the man, he is still homeless. And his side of the story, a brief version of which he gave me in the cafe, has not been heard. We didn't put the accusation of having steamed open my letter to the landlady (no doubt because we don't know how to do it or we don't know the implications of so accusing a person; we're out of our depth).