Can Andy Burnham actually end rough sleeping by Christmas?

Thousands of people are thought to sleep rough in London each night (Picture: Henry Nicholls/AFP via Getty Images) A month ago, Andy Burnham stood outside 10 Downing Street and said his ‘first instruction’ as Prime Minister would be to end rough sleeping in the UK. According to the Chain database, which tracks rough sleeping in London, around 782 people will have made their bed on the streets of surrounding Westminster in the hours after that pledge was made. The borough consistently records the highest levels of rough sleeping in the UK, standing as a symbol for how seemingly intractable this issue has become. While numbers in parts of the nation’s capital have been dipping slightly, its street population still hovers close to 4,000 people, according to Chain. Today, Burnham and his Housi