HOMELESS HEROES

We are all familiar with cheering crowds applauding soldiers as they march off to war and the unstinting praise of politicians as they fall over each other in heaping adulation on service veterans, but the reality is far different. "One in 10 homeless people in the UK are former members of the armed forces, a charity working with veterans says. A survey in 1997 by the Ex-Service Action Group on Homelessness suggested that 22% of people who were "street homeless" had a military background. Veterans’ charity, the Sir Oswald Stoll Foundation, said that efforts by the government and the voluntary sector had brought that down to about 10%. It fears the numbers may rise because of service in Iraq and Afghanistan." (BBC News, 7 August) RD