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Police force hands out sleep pods for homeless

Louise HobsonNorth East and Cumbria
News imageBBC A man and a woman, smiling, stand outside a police station next to a blue sign which reads 'Bishop Auckland Police Station'. To the left, a woman with long blonde hair, wearing a dark blue hoodie, holds a big black duffel bag with the words 'Sleep Pod'; to the right, stands a man wearing glasses and a police uniform - there is a Sleep Pod, also in a duffel bag, on the ground beside him.BBC
Bishop Auckland Neighbourhood Policing Team have been working with homeless charity Cornerstone for the past year

Some Neighbourhood Policing teams in the North East are carrying emergency shelters, known as Sleep Pods, to help the homeless.

Durham Constabulary has been given 100 Sleep Pods to provide temporary shelter to people sleeping rough and helping protect them from the elements.

Officers can distribute the pods to vulnerable people they meet and record their location to share with local support services.

Matt Foggin, PCSO with Bishop Auckland Neighbourhood Policing Team, said the initiative had been effective as a first step. He said: "We can put that intervention into place and hopefully that person is a little bit safer for that night until mainstream services can get involved."

The Bishop Auckland Neighbourhood Policing team started working with local homelessness charity, Cornerstone Supported Housing and Counselling, about a year ago.

The charity is a regional distribution hub for Sleep Pods, and regularly gives them to individuals across County Durham and Hartlepool who are sleeping rough.

The pods allow them to mark individual locations and set up continued support.

Sleep Pod, the charity behind the emergency shelters, donated 100 units to Durham Police for officers to hand out in April.

Each of the 21 neighbourhood policing teams carry between three and five pods.

News imageA man and a woman are crouched down on the floor at either end of the Sleep pod - a long, black, single-person tent in the shape of a triangle. There is a black dog laying down behind the pod The woman has long blonde hair, wears a dark blue hoodie and blue latex gloves. The man wears a police uniform and latex gloves. Both hold opposite ends of the triangular shelter.
Nicky Morson said Sleep Pods are preferable to complete tents, which "encourage people to sleep together" and can cause "antisocial behaviour"

Nicky Morson, communication and support lead at Cornerstone, said this partnership offered an exciting step forward in confronting the issue of homelessness.

"The whole point of the police carrying Sleep Pods is to give people they are finding, who are rough-sleeping, an option," she said.

"Before, if they hadn't been too naughty, they couldn't get locked up - or if they weren't poorly enough, they couldn't go to hospital. And they were left.

"But with a Sleep Pod, they can be sighted."

PCSO Foggin said, previously, officers would try to support individuals to return to their families, or anywhere else where they could stay among friends, but found that in some cases - due to offending behaviour - the people who found themselves homeless had "burnt all [their] bridges".

Now the police are able to distribute Sleep Pods, those isolated individuals can stay safe, and officers can notify Cornerstone to provide additional support.

He said the carrying the pods gave officers peace of mind,

"The benefit is knowing we can do that little bit extra.

"We are the neighbourhood policing team, so it is for the community - we make people safer and, hopefully, reduce crime and offending behaviour."

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