Factors that meant people without regular jobs/fixed homes increased/became increasingly visible to authorities:
Statutory responses show a mix of charitable/welfare concerns, the desire to prevent rewarding the healthy but idle (sturdy beggars), and the fears of public disorder that could result from the itinerant poor (vagrants and vagabonds) turning to violence and/or theft.
Some key statutes & developments up to the 1601 Act
22 Henry 8 c 12 Statutes of the Realm, v 3 p 328
27 Henry 8 c 25 Statutes of the Realm, v 3 p 558
39 Eliz 1 c 4 Statutes of the Realm, v 4 p 899
43 Eliz 1 c 2 Statutes of the Realm, v 4 p 962
From 1572 Overseers of the Poor appointed in parishes
From 1601 duties of Overseers & Churchwardens defined
Later reigns also saw a lot of statutory interventions
14 Chas 2 c 12 - every pauper had a place of legal settlement
1691 ways of acquiring settlement laid down
1696-1721 growth of Union workhouses
13 Anne c 11 Vagrancy transportable offence
22 Geo.3 c.83 "Gilbert’s Act" – allowed outdoor relief, leaving workhouse places for the aged and infirm
3 Geo 4 c 40 Vagrancy (England) Act
5 Geo 4 c 83 For the Punishment of Vagabonds, Rogues, and idle and disorderly persons
From the 1790s onwards increasing recognition that reform was needed resulting in
1795 – Speenhamland system – a sliding scale for outdoor relief related to the price of grain
1815 Abridgement of abstract of answers and returns relative to expense and maintenance of poor in England and Wales, 1813–1815 BPP, 1818, XIX.1 (82)
1832 Royal Commission to investigate state of the poor laws
Poor Law Amendment Act 1834 4/5 Wm 4 c 76
1909 Royal commission on poor laws and relief of distress & 2 volume Minority Report
The National Committee to Promote the Break-up of the Poor Law
Pauper Policies : poor law practice in England, 1780-1850 by Print collection in the Bodleian Libraries
Most of the modern commentary on this topic will be in Bodleian History Reading Rooms or the closed stack.
However the Law Bod's history of crime section may have useful works discussing the problem of vagrancy, forging of licences to beg, passports etc
Subject searches to use in SOLO
Poor laws -- England -- History
Vagrancy -- England -- History
Justices of the Peace - England
Parishes (local government) - England
Constables -- England --- History
Poor -- England - History
The English Poor Law, 1531-1782 by 
Vagrancy in Law and Practice under the Old Poor Law by 
Parish and Belonging: community, identity and welfare in England and Wales, 1700-1950 by Pauper Policies : poor law practice in England, 1780-1850 by Some topics are considered in other pages in this guide, while others are included in separate or different guides. Please use the links below to navigate your way to whatever might help!