The Traveller Movement says it is shocked by the reckless and irresponsible nature of the new Government planning rules for Gypsies and Travellers published over the bank holiday weekend. The new planning policy for Traveller sites includes the re–defining of Gypsies and Travellers, and requires them to prove that they have ‘travelled’ for a number of months in a year to qualify to live on a permanent legal Traveller site. This will cause increased hardship and disruption for both Travelling and settled communities and could force thousands of Gypsy and Traveller families back onto the road, costing councils millions of pounds.
They maintain that the new policy is also discriminatory because it will effectively ban the development of legal Traveller sites in the green belt and in “green open spaces”, at a time when over 200,000 houses are in the process of being built in those very areas. This will create a rural apartheid and Gypsies and Travellers, who have been part of the UK’s culture and heritage for hundreds of years, will become second class citizens.
At a time when the Government’s own figures show a steady increase in the numbers of permanent authorised private Traveller sites (which make up the majority of the total) and a decrease in unauthorised sites, the Traveller Movement questions the method and motive behind these Government changes which, says the Communities and Local Government Secretary of State Greg Clark, are intended to “reduce community tensions”.
The new policy will do the opposite of what SoS Greg Clarke claims and the positive trends of the last seven years towards civil integration and legal sites will be dramatically reversed.
That reversal will be dramatic because of the 2,671 Gypsy and Traveller caravans currently on unauthorised sites could be forced back onto the road. Under the new policy, they will be unlikely to get planning permission because most private sites are in rural locations. There are also a smaller number of Gypsies and Travellers who currently have a temporary permission (approximately 815 caravans) who could also face being put back on the road when their temporary permissions expire. Then there is the status of the thousands and thousands of Gypsies and Travellers who currently live on legal Traveller sites who will need to prove they are ‘travelling’ to continue living there. The impact on Gypsies and Traveller’s already poor education, health and employment outcomes could be disastrous.
The unworkable proposals will also run into legal challenges if councils try to implement them, say planning lawyers experienced in Gypsy and Traveller site provision. Even according to the CLG’s own equalities assessment, the policy breaches equalities laws by discriminating against the old, the disabled, and women.
The policy is an unworkable example of dog whistle politics, and we will not be surprised if yet another CLG Secretary of State appears in the High Court for unlawfully discriminating against Gypsies and Travellers, and for producing policy that trashes the fundamental principles of equality and fairness in British Law.
Yvonne MacNamara, CEO of the Traveller Movement says:
“The new rule changes will make Traveller site provision almost impossible. This will exacerbate the problem of unauthorised encampments in inappropriate places such as playing fields and car parks, causing more hardship and disruption and could bring tensions between settled and Traveller groups to boiling point.”
Lord Avebury, Patron of the Traveller Movement said:
“For centuries Gypsies and Travellers have travelled the length and breadth of the England playing an invaluable role in this country’s socio–economic and cultural development. The closure of the commons, increasing privatisation of land and dramatic economic changes in the last fifty years have resulted in many Gypsies and Travellers ceasing to travel on a regular basis, but the cultural tradition of travelling has lived on in the form of living in caravans on Traveller sites, often with close family relatives.”