Asks parliament for financial support for Ealing Council after 140 incursions

Ealing Common travellers: Liz Jenner

Steve Pound MP made an impassioned plea this week in the House of Commons for more action to be taken over the issue of Traveller encampments.

The debate on the Gypsy and Traveller community took place on 9 October around the time another incursion was being made on Ealing Common.

Mr Pound asked for ‘a few bob’ from the Government for the unanticipated cost of clearing up which he said was crippling the London Borough of Ealing and had reached a quarter of a million pounds. Nationally the number of Traveller caravans on authorised sites rose from 14,498 in July 2010 to 17,938 in July 2016. He said that these are not really encampments but, in fact, are illegal businesses and that the community loses confidence in the authorities when a ‘great glistening cavalcade of chromium-plated 4x4s’ arrives in the area and nothing appears to be done.

He paid tribute to Ealing council officers working on the issue naming Yasmin Basterfield, Chris Bunting, Jess Murray and Paul Murphy who he said do an incredible amount of work with their teams. However he said that Section 61, the provision that allows local authorities to remove travellers was not strong enough and needs to be enforced properly. He asked what advice the Minister in attendance at the debate, Alok Sharma Minister of State (Communities and Local Government) would give to the Home Secretary about a protocol to enforce it. He also raised the issue of legal advisers in magistrates courts not being able sign the warrants over the weekend and why the DVLA database of car registrations could not be used to identify the people responsible and prosecute them.

He told the house, “Ealing is not blessed with huge open spaces, but the open spaces that we have tend to be public parks, school playing fields, sports fields and golf courses, every one of which has suffered from a Traveller incursion in the last few years. It is not as if Ealing is one of the boroughs that say, ‘We will have no Travellers.’ We are not a borough that sets its face against people who have every right to identify themselves as having a certain ethnicity. We have a caravan site. Every time there is an unauthorised encampment in the borough, we investigate the status of the children to establish whether they are receiving education and what their health conditions are. We do not try to shove people off without a second thought. Nevertheless, between 2012 and this summer there have been 140 illegal occupations in the London borough of Ealing, the majority of which have been on council land.

“I have had interactions with the travelling community since the mid-1970s, as a housing officer, as a housing association officer, as a councillor, and even as a mayor and a Member of Parliament. I entirely accept that there are some who will approach you when they move on to the land and say, “I am the guy in charge: if you have any problems, come and see me.” Others, however, will commit the most ghastly antisocial behaviour, such as throwing stones at cars, and a couple of weeks ago there were some horses at a petrol station on the A40. That is cruelty to the horses, but it is also pretty appalling for the people who live in the area.

“There are some who take things too far in the wrong direction, and worst of all are those who use the encampment for fly-tipping. There is no more heart-breaking sight than a sports field where a group of amateur footballers have been trying to get together to play football—to bring people together for the good of the community—and there is a 2-metre-deep pile of asbestos-ridden household waste that costs us a fortune to clear up. Let me give the House a rough idea of what that means. The legal costs alone in the London borough of Ealing between June 2016 and the present time were more than £200,000, and officer time amounted to more than £130,000. Our borough is not swimming in cash. I doubt that any Member in the Chamber represents a constituency that has more money than it knows what to do with, but our clear-up costs amounted to £250,000.”

Alok Sharma, said, “while it is right that we seek to deal with illegal encampments, which are perpetrated by a small percentage of the Gypsy and Traveller community, we need to do everything we can to improve the life chances of that community. The Gypsy and Traveller community has had poor life chances for too long, and it is the ethnic group with the lowest educational attainment and the worst health outcomes.

Andrew Slaughter, the Labour MP for Hammersmith said, “ I am pleased that the Minister has put some perspective into his comments by noting that a very small minority of the Gypsy and Traveller community is in unauthorised encampments, from within the small minority who are actually travelling—three quarters are settled in brick and mortar accommodation. “

He added, “ I was dismayed, as I am sure other colleagues were, by the title of the debate. ‘Gypsies and Travellers and local communities’ immediately suggests division. Gypsies and Travellers are part of local communities, and there is an inherent contradiction in the title of the debate. I am sorry that some of the comments we have heard today have echoed the calumnies and untruths that appear in the media, especially papers such as the Daily Mail, The Sun and the Channel 4 Gypsy wedding series.”

The Government intend to consult on the effectiveness of enforcement against unauthorised developments and encampments. They say they want to seek views on whether there is anything they can do to ensure that existing powers can be used more effectively.

October 12, 2017