THE Tory government’s policing Bill could effectively criminalise homeless people, leading charities warned today as they urged ministers to reconsider the widely condemned legislation.

In a letter to Housing and Communities Secretary Robert Jenrick, 13 charities and housing groups said that the legislation needs urgent changes so that people do not risk arrest and imprisonment for sleeping rough.

The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill will soon be considered by peers after it passed the Commons with Tory support by 365 votes to 265 on Monday. 

The letter’s signatories, including the heads of Shelter, Crisis, St Mungo’s and the Chartered Institute of Housing, called for the legislation to be scrapped or at least amended to lessen its potential impact on homeless people.

Gypsy, Traveller and Roma (GTR) communities have raised similar concerns, saying that the Bill could threaten their way of life by criminalising trespass.

Offenders risk fines, imprisonment or confiscation of vehicles – and for many GTR people, this would mean losing their home.

The letter said: “As currently drafted, the legislation risks putting any person who resorts to living in a car, van or other vehicle – or indeed has a vehicle parked near where they may be sleeping rough – at risk of arrest if they have been asked to leave by the landowner or police.

“While this could apply in rural areas, it could also apply in city-centre car parks, a public road or private driveway. People who are homeless have to sleep somewhere.”

Any benefits due from the promised repeal of the 1824 Vagrancy Act could be undone by the legislation, the charities pointed out.

It would be “deeply unfortunate if this new legislation meant that, almost 200 years later, we saw further criminalisation of people sleeping rough by a modern-day police Bill,” the letter stressed.

A government spokesperson said: “The policing Bill applies only to those residing on, or intending to reside on, land with a vehicle who cause significant damage, disruption or distress.

“We’re investing £750 million over the next year alone to tackle homelessness and rough sleeping.”

The proposed legislation has sparked nationwide protests, with campaigners warning it would also allow police to impose restrictions on protests on the grounds of noise and create criminal offences for demonstrators who cause “serious annoyance.”