§ Mr. VazTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment (1) what investigations and surveys he has undertaken in the past two years into the size and extent of the problem of people sleeping rough in snow or extreme cold outside London; and if he will make a statement;
(2) what inquiry he has made into the number of people who slept rough in snow or extreme cold in Leicester last winter.
§ Mr. YeoMy Department has not undertaken any research into the number of people outside London sleeping rough during the last two winters. The most reliable estimate of the numbers sleeping rough outside London is in the 1991 OPCS census supplementary monitor on people sleeping rough, which was placed in the Library on 9 July. This reported that 33 people were sleeping rough on the streets of Leicester on the night of 21–22 April.