March 13, 2024
Our MD will spend a night sleeping outside at Leicester Tigers
On April 11, I’ll settle down for a night in the open at Leicester Tigers.
The CEO Sleepout will bring me together with others from the local business scene to bed down for the night at the Mattioli Woods Welford Road Stadium.
It’s all designed to raise money for local homelessness prevention charities.
I saw the event last year and made a mental note to sign up in 2024.
I know that the reality is that my experience will be nothing like that of people who are actually homeless.
I’ll have had a meal the night before and a home to return to. I’ll be safe, there’ll be people to talk to, toilets to use.
But what the event will do is offer me a small insight into homelessness, while raising awareness of a fundamental social issue.
Rise in homelessness
Homelessness is a wider issue than rough sleeping.
Research from Shelter showed at least 309,000 people in England spent Christmas without a home - including almost 140,000 children.
Closer to home, Leicester has seen a huge rise in recent years in the number of people who either are homeless or face becoming homeless.
Leicester City Council data shows that the number of people and families living in temporary accommodation has increased 87% since the start of August 2022 (when it was 94) to 332 in December 2023.
The lives of people around us are impacted daily by homelessness - their whole way of life changes.
Living in temporary accommodation, family life is affected, adults struggle to find work, there are health repercussions.
And with the current cost of living crisis and affordable housing shortages, the numbers aren’t going to drop.
Getting involved
I’m aiming for The CEO Sleepout to be the start of something more for us - I’m already exploring further ways that MSSL can get involved.
Sleepouts will take place up and down the country, but money raised locally will stay in the area and go towards fighting homelessness and poverty within Leicester and Leicestershire.
If you would like to donate some funds to the CEO Sleepout that would be much appreciated and will help raise vital funds to fight homelessness. You can donate here
What is the CEO Sleepout?
CEO Sleepout is a national charity set up to inspire the business community to unite to fight homelessness; raising money for frontline services, helping to change lives.
CEO Sleepout brings business leaders together to make a stand against homelessness
They have raised a phenomenal £3m from over 4,800 participants, and donated money to over 100 hard-working charities on the frontline of homelessness, changing countless lives
Sign up to a local sleepout here.
