FEATURES

The Big Issue has been helping homeless people for more than two decades now. Mike White goes out on the street to find out what it’s like being one of the magazine’s hardy vendors.

People look at you differently when there’s a Big Issue in your hand. With some, there’s a friendly hello and an encouraging smile. With others, it’s a swift aversion of the eyes, a thousand-yard stare or a scowl of open disapproval. Mostly, the unfriendly ones are simply a bit embarrassed. They don’t want to buy a magazine but they feel they should, so they’re ashamed. Thus we see all the awkward avoidance techniques – the pretend phone call, the sudden swerve to the other pavement, the exaggerated checking of a wristwatch.

For over 20 years, The Big Issue has been offering homeless and vulnerably housed people the opportunity to earn themselves a legitimate income. The organisation is divided into two parts: ‘the Company’, which produces and distributes the magazine to street vendors; and ‘the Foundation’, a registered charity which exists to help those vendors gain control of their lives by addressing the issues which have contributed to their homelessness. The magazine (read by over 670,000 people a week) thus supports the Foundation, which in turn supports over 2,900 homeless and vulnerably-housed people across the country.

But what’s it actually like on the frontline? There, on the pavement, in the rain, trying to flog the mag and earn a crust? To find out, I’m spending a shift with Martin, a smiling, self-effacing man of 38. The word ‘WIZZ’ is tattooed across the fingers of one hand, a giant ganja leaf on the other. We meet at The Big Issue’s bustling Bristol office on Stokes Croft at coffee o’clock in the morning. Commuters hurry past outside; peg-legged pigeons squabble over last night’s chips. Inside, vendors wait to collect their day’s stock (they buy the magazines for £1, sell them for £2). Friendly volunteers help organise pitches and paperwork. The walls are papered with information – maps, helpline numbers and fact sheets: where to get counselling, medical help, free food.

Behind the counter is the effervescent Rachel Purvis, senior sales and outreach worker. “The job title doesn’t really cover it,” she says. “I’m responsible for helping vendors find pitches, making sure that they adhere to the code of conduct, that they know how to sell the magazine. Also the badging up and assessments – every new vendor has to go through an induction process, which lets us identify any needs they have, and direct them towards the best people to help them meet those needs and set them on the road to getting out of homelessness. The code of conduct is a list of dos and don’ts to make sure that the vendor’s clear about what we can offer them, and what they can and can’t do whilst selling The Big Issue. Sometimes it is difficult – there are disputes over pitches, some people try to beg with the magazine. You’ve probably seen some of them wandering around, unbadged, with one magazine, saying ‘it’s my last issue, can I keep it’. That’s totally not allowed. But we can usually smooth things out so everyone’s happy.”

Martin’s been through a lot – a lifetime of alcohol and drug abuse, occasionally funded by crime – but is a ready source of jokes and anecdotes, and more than happy to delegate a few hours’ selling duties to me. He offers me a few tips. Smile. But not too much or you look mad. Make eye contact as early as you can, but don’t stare (see above). Stand right on the corner, at the pavement’s edge, facing towards the buildings – that way you can simultaneously face people coming from two directions. Then he leaves me to it, retreating to a nearby window sill to roll a fag and check Facebook on his smartphone.

Like a lot of Big Issue sellers, Martin is not what most of us would call homeless. He was sleeping rough when he first came to The Big Issue, but with their help he now has a flat and a small but regular income. As we cycle slowly up from Stokes Croft to Martin’s pitch in Clifton village, he tells me about his chequered past.

“I grew up in Plymouth, in a family that was full of alcohol. I don’t blame my life on anyone, but I suppose it was a natural thing for me to go that way. I did a lot of drinking and crime, and that led me into drugs. I tried to get away from it, moving to Cardiff first, then back to Plymouth. I had a habit, I was doing robberies – shops and that – and kept getting into trouble. I asked to be put into prison but they said ‘no, we’re going to put you back out, you can sort yourself out’. So that’s when I came to Bristol. As soon as I got off the bus I saw someone selling The Big Issue and I thought ‘I could do that’. Things have got better since then. I’ve spent quite a bit of time on the streets here, but I’ve never done any crime in Bristol. I’ve been here six or seven years now, and I haven’t been in trouble for all that time.

“For a long while I was sleeping rough. I’d use night shelters when I could, but they’ve only got a certain number of beds and it’s first come first served, so I often ended up sleeping in car parks, on benches, down by the docks near Welsh Back. I’ve been everywhere. I remember being down in the Bear Pit one night when a guy froze to death there. Another bloke burned to death – he was in some bushes, with a bit of tarpaulin over. Nobody knows how it happened. Shakes you up, stuff like that.

“Trying to get off heroin addiction is extra difficult when you work the streets. On city centre pitches, people kept asking me where they could score, offering to share some if I’d take them to a dealer. It’s terrible if you’re trying to avoid drugs – someone reminding you it’s there, offering you some for free. I’d always say no. Then five minutes later I’d crack and start running after them. I tried a course of cold-turkey with the Salvation Army. I was supposed to be in there for two weeks. I did my two weeks and I was going to leave, but they talked me into staying for another weekend, and that weekend a guy came in there who was climbing the walls going ‘I need drugs, I need drugs’. He broke his window, climbed out and got some and I took it with him. I was straight back to where I started.

“There used to be a night shelter down in St Judes and they helped me onto [the heroin substitute) methadone, through the Smart programme. Now I’ve moved from methadone to Subutex. With methadone you can still use heroin, but with Subutex, if you use heroin it’s supposed to make you really ill, so it’s easier to wean yourself off it. They also introduced me to a woman in the Salvation Army, who got me into a programme called Places for People, who help resettle homeless people. That got me into a flat, which I was able to stay in for two years. After that, I went onto the bidding program with the council to get a flat, which I finally managed a few months ago – my own one-bedroom flat in Greenbank, up by the cemetery. It’s been really good for my mental health, having my own space, a quiet street, a bit of community.

“I’m starting a scheme called Pathways to Employment, looking at all my strengths and building on them, helping me write a CV, so that hopefully I can find a part-time job somewhere. I’ve been selling The Big Issue for seven years now, and they’ve helped me so much. It’s shown me another way of living.”

As we arrive at the pitch, a steady drizzle sets in. “That’s no good,” says Martin. “Cliftonites are solar powered.” On a really good day, he might sell 40 or 50 magazines. So you can make a living out of it – that’s the whole point. Vendors are self-employed – they pay National Insurance and income tax same as everyone else. That said, yesterday (a wet Tuesday in October) Martin only sold three – though this was mainly because the shift to Subutex was making him feel sick.

I ask Martin if he’s still using drugs. He holds my eye. “I’m really trying not to.”

When Martin was on his pitch outside the Coop on Princess Victoria Street a while ago, a bloke asked him to watch his bike, saying he’d forgotten his lock. When he came out of the shop again, the man’s coat was bulging with stolen goods. The security guard came after him, saw Martin with the bike and had him up as an accessory to the crime. “How could I know he was going to do that? I’d never even seen him before.” Nonetheless, Martin lost his pitch.

Now he’s back, on the other side of the street, just outside a bank. “The number of people who leave their money hanging out of the cash point,” he says. “I grab it and run after them and they always look scared, then like they can’t believe that I’d returned it.”

Mags in hand, I wait on the kerb, smiling expectantly at passers-by. “Big Issue, sir? Big Issue, madam?” Two electricians completely blank me; as do a succession of smirking, perma-tanned students in boating shoes and Barbour jackets. And then, half an hour in, our luck begins to change. Our first customer’s a young woman who carefully counts out the exact change. “Anything with Ewan McGregor on it gets my vote!” she laughs. “Women in their 30s are the best customers,” says Martin. Soon, the mags are shifting more steadily – the bulk of them to Martin’s regulars – tweedy gents and little old ladies, mostly.

A man in an £80k Porsche looks physically pained as he realizes he’s parked beside us. “Good morning,” we call. He jangles his keys hurriedly in the air, in lieu of an actual greeting. Money doesn’t buy manners, it seems. A van pulls up, delivering saffron and truffles to the deli across the road. The driver clocks us and locks his door nervously.

The drizzle becomes rain and the crowds thin out. The blank looks and aloof disdain begin to wear us down. We started out with 10 copies; by 11.30 we’ve sold eight. The last two take another hour to shift – one to a twinkly-eyed middle-aged woman with bike panniers, the last to a well-heeled businessman who apologizes in a booming baritone for not having time to chat. Bless him.

From a vendor’s perspective, a friendly ‘hello’, even a simple ‘no thanks’ brings huge warmth. Sure, it’s best if you buy a magazine, but most people don’t, and Martin’s sanguine about that. “Of course not everyone wants one – there’d never be enough if they did. But it’s not buying it or not that matters – it’s how you go about it.” So next time you spot one of those bright Big Issue bibs in the street, go on, give ’em a smile.

FFI: WWW.BIGISSUE.COM

Copyright Mike White 2011