William (Billy) Shea

This is a fundraiser to contribute to the funeral expenses of our good friend and integral part of the local community Mr William (Billy) Shea.

Billy was a full time carer for his sick mother for a decade before she passed away 2 years ago.

When Billy’s beloved mother past away, the DWP removed housing benefit support for the ‘spare bedroom’ he suddenly possessed in his rented flat in Kensal Rise. This spiralled Billy into a circle of debt and mental health problems that were hard to recover from.

With failing health and unable to find work as a 65 year old man with no skills or qualifications, we repeatedly applied for help from the local council/ DWP without success. Billy became severely depressed and suffered a Brain bleed during lockdown and although we were able to support him with extra disability support with his ‘ESA’ he was repeatedly refused PIP or any extra help meeting rent payments.

we tried for 2 years to relocate Billy into a more affordable accommodation, however every agent we contacted refused to allow him to apply for properties due to him being an older man on benefits. Something that is common place in London.

Last year, after exhausting all avenues of support, Billy was left with the choice of paying his rent or paying his phone bills and putting food in his fridge. He unwisely made the choice to stop paying his rent in full and paying other people/ buying food instead. This resulted in an unmanageable debt with his landlord.

Shortly afterwards Billy’s landlord issued a Section 21 notice to evict him from his flat. The notice period ended last week leaving him with the prospect of being removed forcefully by bailiffs. The landlord was asked many times over the last 12 months to show empathy and accept a repayment schedule. Instead, he decided to push for a CCJ to ‘insure he could not find alternative accommodation’. A completely unnecessary addition to Billy’s stress.

The landlord and his agents harassed Billy daily with letters and phone calls which made him terrified to leave his flat. He started drinking heavily and staying at home for long periods alone.

As Billy’s notice period came to an end last week, he became increasingly distant and unable to communicate with anybody regarding his situation. I continued to do this on his behalf as I have for almost a year, but the landlord remained stoic in his mission to harass Billy and unrelenting in his cruelty towards him.

After several days of his phone being turned off, Billy was unfortunately found dead yesterday in his flat by myself and the police. Billy took his own life as he could not face a future as a homeless man with no hope of securing accommodations and no help from Brent Council in regards to council accommodations.

Billy had no living family.

Billy had left behind a mountain of debt with no way to cover the full expense of a fitting funeral.

Billy lived 65 years without a home to call his own, so if you can, we ask that you donate just a little to help raise enough to give him a permanent place to rest where we will lay him with the ashes of his beloved Mother.

Any funds raised above the cost of Billy’s funeral will be donated to homeless charities in London.

Thank you for reading. Xxx