Olaf S died on a park bench close to St Michael’s Church, Hamburg. He was homeless and had braved sleeping out in the elements on a night when the temperature dropped below freezing. Two of his old friends, in collaboration with German street magazine Hinz&Kunzt, try to understand the circumstances of Olaf’s tragic decline.

Cologne-born Linda, a Draussenseiter vendor, was homeless for eleven years. Now, she runs her own self-help group for women on the streets and is passionately committed to ensuring that homeless women are properly supported. Here, she looks back on her life and discusses the positive legacy of her homelessness: those years endowed her with a sense of purpose that she has channelled into helping others.

When The Big Issue Australia published their first issue, 60,000 Australians were homeless. Now, that number is almost double. New census figures released this month show that there are more than 116,000 people who don’t have a place to call home. For their latest edition, The Big Issue decided to go beyond the statistics to hear from the very people these numbers represent – their vendors. Their stories are illuminating, devastating, and hopeful, and evidence that homelessness is more than not having a place to sleep.

In Germany, 100,000 women have no home of their own and a quarter of all homeless people are women. bodo spent time with four women from Bochum who are facing homelessness. They talked about their experiences and explained why women who live on the streets are ignored.

The ONE Festival of Homeless Arts showcases and celebrates works of art, in a variety of mediums, imagined and created by people who have experienced homelessness. Curated and compiled by artist and campaigner David Tovey, the exhibition at the Diorama Arts Centre kicked off its second instalment on World Homeless Day.

This is the first in a series of interviews with European policy makers on homelessness. It is part of a collaboration between INSP (International Network of Street Papers) and the European Federation of National Organisations Working with the Homeless (FEANTSA) in the context of the campaign: ‘Be Fair, Europe – Stand Up for Homeless People.’ This campaign calls on the European Union to boost efforts to end homelessness.

This first instalment is the result of conversations with Commissioner Corina Crețu, whose work revolves around EU regional policy and the urban agenda, and Commissioner Marianne Thyssen, who is responsible for employment, social affairs, skills and labour mobility.

After witnessing pigs being fed perfectly edible food that had been branded as waste while working on an Australian farm, Adam Smith returned to the UK to establish The Real Junk Food Project, the goal of which is to take food deemed inedible and cook it up into delicious meals, eradicating food waste in the process. At this year’s Global Street Paper Summit, Adam Smith told INSP about his plans to really feed the world.

Can you hand out happiness? Sven Lüdecke, founder of Little Home Cologne, thinks so. He has so far given out 12 tiny houses to homeless people in his city.

New report by EU homelessness organisation Feantsa shows homelessness and housing exclusion on the rise across Europe – except in Finland.

Thirty volunteers brave sub-zero temperatures to support outreach and addition services in Scotland. “It’s about trying to do away with the stigma around homelessness,” says Teen Challenge Strathclyde’s Michael Sturrock.

Humble social entrepreneur Kazi Mannan opens the door of his restaurant to the city’s homeless community, as a place to eat for free.

With under a week to go until American voters cast their vote for a new president, neither candidates have touched on the growing poverty and homelessness issues facing more than 500,000 U.S. citizens.

Hamburg street paper Hinz&Kunzt has hit out against a top local government official who wants to clear homeless people out of the city’s Central Station.

A joint campaign by UK homelessness charities and supporters – including Ian McKellen – is encouraging constituents to put pressure on their MP ahead of the second parliamentary reading of the Homelessness Reduction Bill on Friday.

“Look,” says Brooke, “I’m only five years old. There’s nothing I can do about it… You have the pot of money. Spend some and help people.”

The old poorhouse in the Danish town of Svendborg is now a museum, featuring an exhibition about local street paper Hus Forbi. Vendor Jensine’s life is rough, but when she sees the old poorhouse in Svendborg, she feels privileged.

Former actor-turned-filmmaker Rebecca Kenyon believes documentaries have the power to change attitudes and challenge our way of thinking. Her co-production company, mote of dust films, creates works showing different ways of life about people on the peripheries of society.

Featuring interviews with the founder and exhibiting artists of the One Festival of Homeless Arts at the Diorama Art Studio in Central London across August and September.

“After seven years of being homeless, I can see firsthand why everything is a mess – which inspired me to write this article.” Megaphone vendor Ron McGrath invites us all to solve homelessness together.