John Bird (The Big Issue Founder)

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John Bird is a a British social entrepreneur. He is best known as the founder of The Big Issue, a magazine that is edited by professional journalists and sold by street vendors affected by homelessness.

Bird was born in Notting Hill, London in 1946. As a child he experienced homelessness and spent several years in an orphanage. By his twenties he had served several prison sentences for theft.^[1]

In September 1991 he launched The Big Issue. He is currently president of The Big Issue Foundation Board of Trustees.^[2] It started as a local London venture, but expanded with specific editions and services to other British cities, and then to other countries.

In June 1995 Bird was awarded the MBE for ‘services to homeless people’ and in 2006 he received the prestigious Beacon Fellowship Prize for his energy and originality in raising awareness of homelessness and his support of homeless communities worldwide.

In 2006 he set up the Wedge card, an internet-based affinity card system designed to support small business and local enterprise, with the slogan "Think local. Shop local".

In March 2007 he announced his intention to stand for election to the post of Mayor of London as an independent candidate. ^[3] In May 2007 he unveiled his election manifesto for the 2008 poll. ^[4]

However, in October 2007 he announced that he had decided not to stand for election, and was instead going to launch a movement that was "going to try and do what the CND did over the bomb, but over social injustice." ^[5]

In December 2007 he controversially agreed with Westminster Council who declared that they were opposed the presence of soup kitchens on the streets of London. He said:

We wouldn't want to feed our dogs on the streets. There would be an outcry if there was a law that came out tomorrow, saying everyone had to feed their dogs on the streets. But we feed our homeless people on the streets. It is barbaric.^[6]

He also said:

We have to stop supplying people with the means of being emergency refugees on the streets... no one has ever got off the streets simply because they've been fed a good bowl of soup. ^[7]

John Bird has recently become a Social Enterprise Ambassador. Social enterprises use a business to address a social or environmental need. To find out more about Social Enterprise Ambassadors and the work they do, visit the Social Enterprise Ambassadors website. The Social Enterprise Ambassadors programme is led by the Social Enterprise Coalition and is supported by the Office of the Third Sector.