THE number of street beggars in Bournemouth town centre is ‘embarrassing for the town’, claims one local resident.

Paul Prince, who lives in Ophir Road, said he was approached by more than a dozen people asking for money while walking home from the fireworks on Friday night.

Mr Prince, 75, walked from the seafront, through the Square and up Old Christchurch Road to his home in the Lansdowne area with some tourists visiting from Blackpool.

“It was absolutely terrible,” said Mr Prince.

“And it wasn’t just the fact that we were being stopped and asked for money every few metres. It was that when we said no some of the people spat at us or were verbally abusive and threatening.

“If I were a tourist I would have a pretty bad view of the town. It is just completely embarrassing.”

Mr Prince also said that for many people the experience would be “very intimidating”.

“You should be able to walk through Bournemouth on a busy night like that one without having to fear for your safety,” he added.

He also said that he would be passing on his concerns about the amount of aggressive street beggars in Bournemouth to Police and Crime Commissioner Martyn Underhill.

Central Bournemouth ward councillor Robert Chapman told the Daily Echo: “It is a problem in every shopping centre in the country. A lot of these people are not homeless, they’re begging for money because it is the height of the holiday season and they’ve got a good audience.

“A lot of these people are being driven into the centre of town and left to sit on the streets begging. Then they get a decent amount of money and go back to where they are staying.

“It is high time something is done about it, we are making a lot of effort in Bournemouth to make sure people who are in need are looked after, the people who are genuinely homeless.

“But the majority of the people begging on our streets today are not genuinely homeless.

“I was walking along Westover Road the other day and a middle-aged woman was chatting away to a beggar with her purse out. This is something the police should be doing a lot more to assist us in.”

Last week the Echo reported how officials in neighbouring Poole were looking target aggressive beggars and related antisocial behaviour in Poole town centre.

The Borough of Poole is looking at placing a new Public Space Protection Order on the town centre, which would see a ban on bagging, street drinking and drug use.;

The focus of the order would be on the area around Poole High Street.

Homeless man 'urinated in front of passing children'

A HOMELESS man, one of a group drinking by Bournemouth War Memorial, urinated in front of passing children - then hurled abuse at a resident who remonstrated with him.

Paul Jones, who was walking his dog in the town’s central gardens on Thursday, encountered the group around 11am.

Mr Jones, 51, said that as he passed the group one stood to urinate in public, and when he attempted to remonstrate with them, they grew abusive.

Mr Jones, who lives in nearby Norwich Avenue West, said: “One of them just urinated facing everybody, as people with young families were walking past.

“I said to the three of them ‘do you really think that’s acceptable?’

“They just started being abusive and threatening, at me and at people walking past who were looking.”

Mr Jones walked to the tennis club and used its phone to contact police. The force has confirmed officers were sent to the scene but they found nothing amiss.

“This was right opposite the council offices. We are all aware Bournemouth has a big homeless problem. The Triangle is the ‘OK Corral’ now, you constantly get stopped by homeless people begging for money and when you say no they get aggressive.”