Hundreds of people are facing a grim Christmas on the streets of Liverpool and Merseyside, with rough sleeping hitting record figures for this time of year. In Merseyside, there were an estimated 289 rough sleepers in September - the latest date for official figures - which was 49 more than the previous year and more than double the 127 rough sleepers counted in 2021.
In our area, far more rough sleepers were counted in Liverpool than anywhere else, 161 in September, three times as many as in St Helens (55), which had the next highest number.
The rough sleeping rate - the number of people sleeping on the streets when compared with the size of the population - is also highest in Liverpool. For every 100,000 people who live in the city, there were 32 rough sleepers. That's the equivalent of about one in every 3,000 people being homeless and sleeping on the streets.
David Carter is the chief executive of the Whitechapel Centre, Liverpool's primary homelessness and rough sleeping charity.
He said: "If you went back a few years, the numbers wouldn't ever get to 100. They are still way too high. One person on the streets is way too many, when you have 160 it is shameful.
"It is symptomatic of the crisis, of things being so wrong. Last year we worked with 4,670 different individuals, of those, 1,258 had spent one or more nights sleeping rough in our region. So 27% of everyone we worked with had slept rough. That should be the absolute minority, it is disgusting.
"The numbers of people coming through our doors have continued to increase but the single biggest cohort is those rough sleeping. It was a 20% increase last year."
The Ministry of Housing Communities and Local Government says the numbers of people sleeping rough "are at record highs for this time of year".
An estimated 9,292 people were seen sleeping rough across England in September, 299 more than in the same month the previous year, and a 76% increase from the 5,287 rough sleepers recorded in September 2021.
The worrying figures come as the Labour government announces its major plan to end the country's homelessness crisis.
The plan contains three new pledges, aiming to halve the number of long-term rough sleepers by the end of this Parliament term, reduce the time families are spending living in temporary bed and breakfast accommodation and to prevent more people from becoming homeless in the first place.
The government says its plan is backed by a £3.5bn investment and has been shaped by the voices of those who have experienced homelessness.
Mr Carter, who has been at the front-line of tackling Liverpool's own homelessness crisis in recent years, said it was positive to see this commitment, but said it is only a start, with much more investment needed.
He told the ECHO: "It is always heartening when someone commits to something isn't it. They have said they are going to halve the number of people rough sleeping.
"It has been a long time coming and we have got to an absolute crisis, so you do think could we have got here earlier but it is brilliant that there is a commitment now.
"It is definitely a step in the right direction. It is good to have a three-year strategy and at the heart of it is the fact that prevention is key. That is heartening because we know the damage that homelessness causes is phenomenal so prevention being recognised is brilliant.
"When austerity came, the first things that went were prevention services and we shouldn't be waiting for people to be in crisis, the damage is done at that stage. So they are using the right language. But it is only a start."
Meanwhile, Liverpool Wavertree Labour MP Paula Barker, who chairs the All-Party Parliamentary Group for ending homelessness told Sky News that the government plan has a "depressing lack of meat on the bone".
She said: ""From what I have seen so far, it leaves more questions than it answers - where are the clear measures around prevention? Where is the accommodation for people sleeping rough coming from - has it already been built? What about specialised provision for those fleeing domestic abuse? We needed this strategy to be bold."