The Tory politician demanding police take homeless people off the streets ahead of the Royal Wedding is a paid director of a government agency that’s supposed to be tackling rough sleeping, Scrapbook can reveal.

Windsor and Maidenhead council chief Simon Dudley hit the headlines yesterday after asking Thames Valley police to use the 1824 Vagrancy Act to remove homeless people from the streets before the ceremony at Windsor Castle on May 19. He wrote:

“A large number of adults that are begging in Windsor are not in fact homeless, and if they are homeless they are choosing to reject all support services to beg on the streets of Windsor. In the case of homelessness amongst this group, it is therefore a voluntary choice.”

Murphy James of the Windsor Homeless Project called his comments “sickening” and said the Council was offering them “rat-infested” accommodation.

So we were surprised to find that Dudley sits on the board of a public body – the Homes and Communities Agency – with responsibility for helping homeless people.

The leader of Theresa May’s local authority said he expected to be paid between £10,000 and £20,000 upon taking-up the taxpayer-funded role in February.

One of the Agency’s major programmes is the Homelessness Change fund , which is designed to:

“Provide tailored hostel accommodation and improved facilities for the provision of healthcare, training or education for rough sleepers with the aim of helping them off the streets and transforming their lives.”

We’re not sure the criminal charges which Dudley is demanding be brought against Windsor’s homeless is going to do much to “transform their lives.”

Just like Toby Young, another Tory plant at a public body goes badly wrong…