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| A travellers' site in Norfolk |
As many will know, a growing number of travellers have been encamped on Chilton Grain’s land on Chilton Airfield for over two weeks now, having been in the Sudbury area for over six. It is my understanding that a notice of eviction has, or shortly will be, served, and the travellers must move on by Monday or risk prosecution.
However, since there is a real danger that instead of leaving the airfield the travellers will move immediately onto adjacent Suffolk County Council land, the County Council decided to pre-empt further problems. Accordingly a Stakeholder Meeting was called yesterday with a view to making a decision as to whether the County should tolerate any future encampment, or whether to start the process of evicting the group.
I have to say that I was impressed by the clear headed professionalism of Suffolk County Council’s Gypsy and Traveller liaison team, who are clearly keen to keep ahead of the game, and who are acutely aware that additional issues may occur later in the year following the eviction of travellers from Dale Farm in Essex.
The protocol that is used in these circumstances makes interesting reading and I am happy to forward an electronic copy to anyone that is interested. The bottom line is that, by law, a great many hoops must be jumped through to ensure that the travellers’ and local residents’ rights are given equal weight.
In my opinion it is proper that all people’s rights are protected, and the official process makes a good stab at this, but we are not really operating on a level playing field. Unlike the settled community, the travellers are effectively trespassers, often cause environmental problems, and do not have planning permission for their activities. It is hard to be 'blind' to these factors when weighing the ‘rights’ of one group against another.
Some people think that providing more permanent sites would resolve the problem and I shared this view. However, among the many fascinating things I learnt yesterday, it appears that that many travellers actually have been allocated permanent sites, but still feel the need to travel to congregate with friends and family during the summer months.
Yesterday’s meeting was attended by no fewer than 18 people including an Inspector of Police, two County Council Cabinet members, one District Councillor (me), four senior County Council officers, representatives of Great Waldingfield and Chilton Parish Councils, Bradley (the community warden), and three members of Babergh’s enforcement team. This represents an unusually large number for such meetings, but, nonetheless, I dread to think what the total cost to the public purse was, taking into account salaries being paid, legal costs and mileage travelled to attend the meeting.
It might be worth it if a permanent solution was being achieved, but presumably, the whole roundabout will start once again when our travellers move on to pastures new. What is to be done?
There are a number of solutions, but they would involve a change in the law of trespass, something that successive governments seem to shy away from.
ReplyDeleteThe current economic misery facing many in the country might be helped if the so called 'black economy' that many people, possibly including travellers, was clamped down on, and taxes were paid. Costs to remove rubbish and any environmental remedial work should be met by any trespassers’ also. This might affect the cost of this ‘nomadic culture’ and subsequent future actions. To call oneself a traveller, but demand permenent sites makes a mockery of the whole thing, and we have plenty of homeless on our streets to focus on first before we subsidise a lifestyle often at odds with the 'settled'.
The British people's tolerance has been abused and taken for granted in many matters, and the actions of French President Sarkozy in moving Gypsies out of France, much to the distress and anger of the Romanian government shows a different approach to the UK's.
We focus on following EU rules including well intended Human rights legislation but all one hears of is a lawbreaker’s rights when their actions might have a detrimental impact on other, law abiding people, It needs to be rebalanced, quickly.
We do need to find a solution, but tolerating illegal actions is not the way forward. By all means assess people’s needs, employ people to supervise and ensure individuals rights are met, and continue to pour money into this particular bottomless pit, but To quote a great line from a film, 'don't pee on my back and tell me it's raining.'
I am always puzzled that travellers tend to hail from Ireland; perhaps they could help rebuild that ailing economy after we recently poured taxpayers money into that economy.
Meanwhile, the Chilton airfield needs some from of access control immediately to stop it from becoming a huge tip and the sooner the better. The land around the truck depot is full of rubbish as is the approach to the recycling site. A narrower road way, with gates is the only option and the space occupied by the travellers teh first time needs to be fenced off.
Prevention is always better than the cure.