The work of the photographer Nick Hedges, who has died aged 81, revealed the reality of the atrocious living conditions of the UK’s urban poor in the 1960s and 70s. His compassionate work transformed perceptions, and helped galvanise social change.
In 1966, a new charity was launched: Shelter, the National Campaign for the Homeless. That same year, Ken Loach’s revelatory drama documentary Cathy Come Home highlighted the problem of homelessness in a country that complacently believed in the rose-tinted idea of the swinging 60s.
