Can anyone help with these please?
1 Now meaning something inferior which word was given to a rope of woven rushes?
2 Now meaning an absence of quality which word originally described tramps and vagrants in the 16th C?
3 Which word denoting an associate used to be a name for a hip pocket in men's trousers?
A sidekick is an associate and 'kick' is an old word for a pocket. Hence, a sidekick once meant a side pocket rather than a hip pocket. Nevertheless, I'm pretty sure 'sidekick' is the word you're looking for, since there never was a word 'hip-kick' or 'back-kick'!
I wonder if No 2 could be "poor" or "destitute" since there were poor houses and vagrants were often described as the poor or destitute. Check dictionary definitions of poor and destitute.