Lack of adequate mental health care provision is a huge part of it. My first job back in the early-80s was as a trainee psych nurse in one of the last old-school Victorian mental hospitals, a breed that is now long gone aside from a couple of very high-security ones that are closer to prisons. Where I worked anyone ‘homeless’ got rounded-up by the police and dropped off where they were either admitted voluntarily for assessment or sectioned if necessary and if nothing else got a bath, clean clothes and a warm bed and food for a while. I only ever became aware of ‘homeless’ cluttering up doorways etc once these hospitals were closed by Thatcher’s hopelessly misguided ‘care in the community’ policy. A situation that pretty much instantly translated to ‘no care in a doorway’ or wherever. Schizophrenia, bipolar disorder etc are all very easy to spot in the homeless long before one gets to addiction (which is in no way mutually exclusive).
I really don’t believe in the extreme ‘politics of envy’ socialism of some here, folk with ideas, skill, ability and a willingness to work hard should be rewarded, not punished, but it is clear mental healthcare and other aspects of social care has failed catastrophically and now desperately needs properly financing. Few tax payers would disagree with that I’m sure, and I’d argue the very last thing any business wants is some homeless person slumped in their doorway putting the punters off! It is to the Tories eternal shame that they have allowed the situation to deteriorate to the extent we see absolutely everywhere now. Manchester City Centre, my nearest city, is a national embarrassment IMO. It is impossible to look in any direction without there being homeless folk, beggars, junkies etc in view. Many of whom clearly have real mental illness and should not be anywhere near the streets in any civilised country.
I don't recognise the existence of "politics of envy". "The cake" is only so big and anyone who has 1000 other peoples slices is in the wrong no matter how they got them. After all it is more often than not those who are most ruthless, backstabbing, without conscience or remorse that become the wealthiest.
"Mere" brains and hard work may get you up to a £50K salary but those who spend that much on "another little trinket for the drawing room" have usually exploited others, shut down rival businesses causing thousands of job losses, done dirty deals and generally exploited the lowest most venal attributes of the human condition to get there.. or just inherited it!
Then there is the way that once you con, steal, embezzle and slime your way to the first million or so you don't even have to work any more to get the next ten... as you have enough to invest in the markets etc and "earn" more in one night than most hardworking people would in a year whilst you sleep...
Except of course you haven't earned it and very likely the change in share prices that made you that extra £100K was due to a takeover of a company in say Malaysia that has now just made 1000 people redundant.... These people morally own that £100K and should not have to face being called envious for wanting their fair slice of the cake!
None of this is fair, decent, just or right.
Obviously "the system" is owned and run by and for these people, which makes it far worse still! Things which should be illegal are encouraged and that which may get in the way of the machinations of these people is made illegal....
That "it's like that and that's the way it is" or "things have always been such" does not excuse it one jot or make it any more OK!
Some will say this is "the law of the jungle", "dog eat dog", "natural selection" and "the survival of the fittest". I say as human beings we should first of all strive to be above dogs, jungles and being mauled by bear markets!
The simple fact that Corbyn will actually do something about all the above is of course why "the system" will do anything to stop him!!