Street Population Manager Ajitha Sajeev, who led Newham’s drive to get homeless people into safer accommodation during the Covid pandemic, has been honoured by the Queen.

Born in Singapore, Ajitha lived in India before settling in East Ham. She has worked with Newham Council for 30 years, first doing translation services and then housing. Today, at the age of 52 and a mother of two, she works with the street homeless team.

She said:

I have been proud to co-ordinate an amazing effort across various Council services and the faith, charity and voluntary sectors, to reach and support hundreds of people into safer accommodation.

Her work won her a British Empire Medal in the Queen’s birthday honours. Ajitha told Newham Voices: I am honoured and humbled but this is a real team effort with support from management, councillors, my peers and, of course, the amazing outreach team.

The work is all about “treating people with the dignity, respect, care and compassion they deserve when they are at their most vulnerable”, according to Ajitha. This does not apply only to times of emergency.

She said: “Before the pandemic hit we had already done a great deal of work through the Mayor’s Rough Sleeping Task Force, to get people off the streets and out of tents.”

With the closure of Stratford Shopping Centre, for public health reasons, during the pandemic the problem got worse, but today, she is “proud to say we have no more tents, and no-one beds down in the Mall.

It makes me very proud, and quite emotional when I see some of the people we have helped, some of whom have been sleeping rough for years resisting efforts to get them off the streets. We’ve genuinely seen lives turned around.

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