Everyone has their own story to tellWEST MIDLANDS POLICE

On the corner of King’s Parade, I recently spoke to a woman who sells the Big Issue. Right next to King’s Chapel sits Jana*, day in, day out. She arrived from Romania two years ago, in search of a better life. Jana is different to other Big Issue sellers, though – and not just because of her gender or headscarf. Jana likes telling her story. Even though her English is broken, her gripping and distressing history draws people in – probably just as much as the sad and desperate look in her eyes.

Many give her more than the Big Issue costs, caught by what she has to say about how she came to England and wasn’t able to find a job. Jana is open about the fact she lives in a flat. She is out on the street because she is about to be evicted, and needs money to still have somewhere tomorrow.  Having worked with many street people over the last two years, in both London and Cambridge, I was more suspicious than most at first. Was her story really true? Or was she bluntly lying to me?

Other homeless people complained about her, too. “She only comes out here before Christmas, and makes our life harder.” David in particular, who busks on King’s Parade, wasn’t happy about her presence: “She takes all my money away. Even my regulars don’t give a shit about me anymore. And it is fucking cold out here.” On a different occasion, I met Mike on Trinity Street, in the middle of the night, waiting for one of the rare passers-by to give him some change. “Really bad day today. People are stingy even though it’s Christmas.”

I was amazed by how open Mike was. A brown glass bottle of methadone was tucked inside his jacket. Tossing it back and forth, he proudly announced that this 100ml of methadone was the only thing he needed to get through the weekend. He didn’t use heroin anymore. Mike claimed to be clean. “But, you know, I still need to make some money. I really can’t work and stuff. Got problems with my back.” Again, I wanted to believe Mike, but I really wasn’t sure what to make of this. Was his whole ‘spiel’ only an invention, fabricated to make money?

On the streets of Cambridge, Jana, David and Mike are competitors. They are after the same spare change, the same sympathy. They employ different tactics to reach this goal. While Jana lets her sensitive eyes and whispered words speak for themselves, Mike boasts of his achievements. David is open about his complaints – and hopes for compassion. As a giver, you can never know what is really true. You rely on what you are told, what you see, feel and hear. All three of them might be lying, and any gift might turn out to be a moral hazard.

But this misses the point. Giving to people on the street goes beyond calculation, beyond even the economics of morality. Why do we need to know what really is true? Why turn a microscopic lens on people who have no privacy anyway? David and Mike are literally living on the street; they don’t have an apartment they can return to at night. We shouldn’t stick to our usual rules when it comes to people on the streets and our gifts to them. If we do, we deny people that try to build a comfort zone in this most uncomfortable environment their right to existence.

Stories, little pleas, even lies, are measures of protection for people on the street. With our obsessive striving for transparent individuals in other realms of society, we are hollowing out the human. Sexuality without secrets is pornography. With the same obsession applied to street people we are making whole lives unliveable.

Gifts to homeless people shouldn’t be earmarked. There can’t be strings attached. They shouldn’t be about control, checks and tests. If we – as a society – can’t decide on one or the other form of basic income, we could at least consider building private zones of humanity. This is what unconditional gifts can be for people living on the street.

*All names in this article have been changed.