The shocking extent of the ‘hidden homeless’ in Greater Manchester is revealed by the M.E.N. today.

With temperatures plummeting, our investigation shows:

A ‘massive’ rise in rough sleeping since the recession - with people living in caves, old air raid shelters and under a supermarket

‘Frightening’ new cuts mean more city hostels could shut, meaning numbers will soar even further

Many hit by a spiral of benefits sanctions and rent arrears - and some suffering Victorian diseases such as trenchfoot.

Official figures show the number of homeless on Greater Manchester streets is 24. But homeless organisations believe the figure is much higher.

Our investigation found insecure jobs, benefits changes and funding cuts have combined to spark a visible surge in rough sleeping.

Official figures are collected one day a year as a ‘snapshot’ - and are widely regarded as inaccurate.

Coun Daniel Gillard, who has just concluded a Manchester Council inquiry on the issue that spoke to dozens of homeless organisations, said he believes around 150 people are now sleeping rough in the city centre – six times higher than the official figure.

He said the authorities had more or less got a grip on the problem in 2009, but since then numbers have rocketed.

Manchester’s Booth Centre, which provides advice, activities, training and hot food for the homeless and those at risk of homelessness, said it was seeing around 170 people a week, a third more than two years ago.

One homeless man, George, has been sleeping rough for 24 years - read his story here, and see the video below to hear from him ...

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In Stockport, the Wellspring centre estimates a 60pc increase in rough sleepers and believes there to now be around 50 in the town.

Both charities pointed to benefits sanctions as one cause. One Stockport man told the M.E.N. he had been ‘sanctioned’ seven times in a row, meaning he could not afford his rent and eventually lost his flat – but cannot get another due to his arrears.

And new people have been living in the Stockport cave we revealed 18 months ago.

Others have been camping out in the town’s old air raid shelter. Although the council sealed it up for safety reasons last month, some of the bricks have already been removed.

Jonathan Billings, who runs the Wellspring, told the M.E.N. it was ‘only a matter of time’ before people used it again, adding: “We have seen a massive rise in homelessness in Stockport.”

Booth Centre chief executive Amanda Croome said she was seeing more people who have recently lost their job, while rent arrears, combined with benefits sanctions, are a major issue.

But cuts to other services – such as hostels and mental health provision – makes it a lot harder to get people off the street.

“We are seeing a lot more people with benefits problems, which leads to debt and problems with housing,” she said.

“That means food poverty is increasing, so we are seeing a lot more people who are dependent on the breakfasts we serve.

“Whereas before, most homeless people had benefits, now they have nothing.”

She pointed to the closure of Greater Manchester Police’s dedicated vagrancy unit two years ago as a significant factor – as its officers used to work closely with the centre to get people housed.

The Salvation Army’s 110-bed hostel closed under the council’s first wave of cuts - but despite the rising figures, Manchester council is now looking at cutting back homelessness funding further as it seeks £60m in savings for 2015.

The Booth Centre alone could lose up to a third of its cash, while up to nine hostels could shut. In total more than £2m could be cut from the homelessness budget.

Council officials admit that could see rough sleeping rise further – as well as crime and hospital admissions.

Amanda said: “We are getting more people becoming homeless and it’s harder to get them off the streets. The prospect of what they’re planning now is really frightening.”

Inspector Rik Byatt, of Greater Manchester Police, said since the begging unit was disbanded, the responsibility for dealing with rough sleeping is now shared across departments - meaning more staff than before are dealing with the issue.

He added: “We have trained all of our PCSOs on the best methods to deal with both begging and homelessness, thereby greatly increasing the number of staff addressing these issues and we continue to work closely with other relevant agencies and organisations.

“This method has since been adopted by other divisions and applied to other areas of the force.”

Homelessness Minister Kris Hopkins said: “This Government has increased spending to prevent homelessness, making over £500 million available to help the most vulnerable in society and have kept strong protections to guard families against the threat of homelessness. This is to ensure we don’t return to the bad old days when homelessness in England was nearly double what it is today.

“However, I am determined to do more, which is why I have recently announced £23 million funding to help1,600 vulnerable homeless young people get their lives back on track with the £15 million Fair Chance fund, while the £8 million Help for Single Homeless Fund will support around 22,000 single homeless people.”

The desperate left living in caves and air raid shelters

With more and more people facing destitution this winter, many are sheltering in caves, air raid shelters and next to underground rivers for warmth.

The M.E.N. revealed 18 months ago how a Ukrainian homeless man had been living in a Stockport cave after slipping through the housing net.

Our story led to him being reunited with his family and he was able to return home.

Reporter Jennifer Williams visited one of the caves - see what she found in the video below ...

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With Christmas approaching we re-visited the town’s precarious riverside warren to find that other homeless people have long since taken his place.

One girl had been sheltering with her boyfriend until a few days earlier - but when the M.E.N. arrived it appeared the camp had been trashed and robbed.

When we returned a few days later, there were already more cave-dwellers, sheltered by a makeshift fireplace in a rocky cranny and blankets hung up on strings.

Across the town there is a network of hideouts just yards from public view that have long been used by the homeless.

But Stockport’s homeless charity the Wellspring is reporting a 60pc surge in rough sleeping, meaning more and more are seeking unlikely places to rest their heads.

A sweep by the police a few weeks ago found people living in the Dodge Hill air raid shelters, a mile-long warren on the edge of Heaton Norris.

(Image: Paul Powers)

They have since been sealed up by the authorities - but we found signs the bricks are already being hacked away.

Under the Asda in Stockport town centre, along the banks of the River Goyt, sleeping bags litter the alcoves.

Even a small hole in the wall at the back of the Merseyway shopping precinct had a man living in it up until a few days ago.

Jonathan Billings. who runs the Wellspring, said: “We have a massive increase in homelessness in Stockport,”

His own count a few weeks ago revealed 35 rough sleepers, but he believes the figure is more like 50.

“Stockport council, to their credit, have accommodated a number of these people but all the hostel provision is now full to bursting,” he added. “The Wellspring is busier than ever.”

To find out about the charity’s Christmas appeal, which seeks donations of rucksacks containing basics, visit www.thewellspring.btck.co.uk

The spiral of decline that left me on the streets and trying to kill myself

As most of us sit down to Christmas with loved ones this week, a growing minority of people are facing winter out on the streets.

Trevor, 57 (not his real name), managed to get help just in time, but only thanks to a Manchester charity currently threatened with huge cuts in council funding.

He went to the Booth Centre after a chain of personal catastrophes left him with nowhere else to go.

A stormy relationship, a domino effect of debts and the pressure of helping to care for a disabled child eventually led to him being evicted.

He dealt with things through ‘excessive drinking’, he says, only plunging him into a deeper spiral of decline.

First he slept in a shed. Later he slept in a bus shelter.

In the end he went to the GP and got some sleeping tablets.

“I bought some cider,” he says. “It was a Thursday. Then I just took the lot. I don’t remember anything else then.”

That was the first of two failed suicide attempts. It was only when a fellow rough sleeper in Piccadilly told him about the Booth Centre that he got help.

“At first I was quiet as a mouse,” he says. “My confidence had gone.”

But he is now volunteering there most days, making breakfasts in the morning, getting training and advice and sleeping in a B&B found for him by the centre.

And because he volunteers, the Booth Centre gives him a bus pass - meaning he can get to his mental health appointments eight miles away.

“Any cuts to the Booth Centre grant would have a devastating effect on all homeless and vulnerable people that have - and will in future - need help,” he adds.

“And many may fall by the wayside. So this place is needed and so are all the others. People think ‘it will never happen to me’.”

‘You lose all hope when you have been on living on the streets’

More and more seriously ill people are ending up destitute on Manchester’s streets, according to the city’s biggest homelessness project.

And it is set to get worse.

Once on the streets, people often quickly fall into a spiral of ill health. But Booth Centre chief executive Amanda Croome said since a string of intertwined services have been cut back, it is harder to get people housed. “The quicker you get people off the streets the better,” she said.

“To be on the streets for a month is incredibly damaging. You lose all hope, you lose all confidence, you lose your ability to communicate and think in a rational way. You often develop physical health problems – you get people with trench foot, which people had in World War One, where their feet literally rot.”

But the lack of hostel places – expected to fall further next year – and cuts to police and health resources has made it much harder to keep people off the streets or move them on once there, even if they are ill.

“We are now getting people who are really unwell and we can’t get them off the street as quickly as we were able to,” she said.

“There are problems with the mental health services being really inadequate. We have got people on the streets who really should be sectioned and should be in hospital but it’s a really difficult process to get them into beds.”

The Booth Centre signposts people to other services such as debt advice - a growing issue thanks to benefits sanctions. Government figures show nearly one in three people who are sanctioned are homeless. But options being considered by the council for next year’s cuts could see the Citizen’s Advice Bureau close.

Meanwhile the Booth Centre itself may lose the funding it gets to advise all but the most vulnerable over-25s, meaning they will have to sleep rough before the council intervenes.

“We will still be able to provide people with beans on toast,” said Amanda.

“And then they’ll tell us they’ve got nowhere to live we will tell them ‘you will have to sleep rough’, because that’s the only support there is.

“And they can’t go to the CAB because they’ve been massively cut.

“It will massively impact on what we can do. It’s quite a frightening thought.”

'Make no mistake, this has been a situation of George Osborne’s and Iain Duncan Smith’s making'

A councillor tasked with investigating the scale of the city’s homeless problem has laid the blame squarely at the government’s door.

Coun Daniel Gillard headed up an inquiry into the ‘visible’ rise in rough sleeping, which reported back last month.

It calls for the police to establish a dedicated homeless team and suggests the council stop pursuing people for housing benefit overpayments when the cash has gone straight to the landlord - and that it convert empty shops or houses into homeless shelters.

But it comes as the council considers big cuts to debt advice and homelessness support.

He said: “Both the council and GMP have been left in near-impossible positions - make no mistake, this has been a situation of George Osborne’s and Iain Duncan Smith’s making.

“Any budget settlement that takes £59m pounds from our city will unfortunately inevitably do harm and negatively impact upon our ability to support rough sleepers, fund hostels for emergency and temporary homeless accommodation and support people with mental health needs and people at risk of becoming homeless.”