Finding Our Voice

The battle for Dale Farm has been a much debated issue, yet if there is one thing that we can all agree on, it will be that it has been the traveller women who have been fighting on the frontline. The recent media coverage has shown that the female residents of Dale Farm do have a voice and an ability to use it well, yet the Gypsy and Traveller communities are still relying on activists to fight their battles, but why?

There is a long history of educational disengagement within the Gypsy and Traveller communities, indeed education has been viewed as somewhat incompatible with our lifestyle. Traditionally we are considered as nomadic groups, however changes in government policy have restricted our traditional way of life and it can be said, particularly for my own generation, that we now tend to lead a far more sedentary life. While it was typical of my parent's generation to move frequently and thus attend numerous different schools, Gypsy and Traveller children today can expect to grow up and attend school in just one or two locations.

It would be misleading to deny that the Gypsy and Traveller culture inhibits educational engagement. While many of us acknowledge the value of reading and writing, the curriculum in general is believed to be somewhat irrelevant to our lifestyles. Gypsy and Traveller girl's are encouraged to marry young and take responsibility for the household , while there is an expectation that boys will follow their fathers into a trade, thus it is not unusual for Gypsy and Traveller children to have left education by the time they are 14 or younger.

It would be simplistic to suggest that cultural barriers alone have been the cause of such widespread disengagement. I would argue, based on my own experience, that the education system has been founded upon middle class values and expectations – that is, a child's worth is measured on academic achievement alone. Gypsy and Traveller children are likely to start school with very little knowledge of mainstream culture. They are thrust into a curriculum that is foreign to them and they are expected to either assimilate to mainstream values or fail. There remains an idea that education is a meritocracy but when Gypsy's and Traveller's are disadvantaged from the very beginning, can this really be said to be true?

On top of this, Gypsy and Traveller children are likely to face great hostility from their non-Gypsy (or Gauja) peers. I was faced with bullying on an almost daily basis throughout my education and this discouraged me from attending school. While I do still resent those who chose to harass me, I also understand that the hostility of my peer's was ultimately shaped by the ingrained views of their parents. Yet there is suspicion on both sides - while Gauja children are taught that Gypsys and Travellers are 'thieving dirty bastards', our own parents are teaching us that all Gauja's hate us, and I know this not to be true.

Nevertheless, while the suspicion of Gypsys and Travellers is mostly unsubstantiated, the threat to the Gypsy and Traveller population remains real. It was just seventy years ago when 500,000 Roma, including members of my own family, were exterminated by the Nazi's. In recent years there has been a significant rise in neo-Nazism across Europe, indeed there has been countless reports in the media of neo-Nazi attacks on Roma people. It appears that we have grounds to be suspicious, thus it is hardly surprising that we maintain a mostly segregated life.

Segregation is an entirely natural process and everyday people segregate themselves based on their religion, ethnicity, sexuality, and social class etc. Yet, segregation unavoidably creates tensions between communities. One only has to look at cities, such as Bradford and London, to see that segregation is damaging social cohesion and breeding intolerance. Still, segregation is very much a part of British society and in fact, the government itself is guilty of funding segregated schooling based on religion. In a supposedly secular country what place do faith schools have in our education system? If our education system can respond to religious needs then surely it can also respond to the needs of Gypsy's and Traveller's? Is there a case for segregated Gypsy and Traveller schools?

I was expelled from a mainstream high school in my final year of compulsory education. I was transferred to a school which catered mainly for Autistic children but also had an intake of students, like myself, who had been unable to integrate into mainstream schooling. The ethos of this school was very much about creating an independent curriculum for each student, one which took into account my culture, my expectations and my values. I maintain that I would not have continued into higher education had it not been for this type of schooling, and thus I argue that while Gypsy and Traveller children remain in the current unresponsive mainstream education system, educational engagement will not increase.

We are living in an age of great financial and technological change and the Gypsy and Traveller communities need to adapt to survive. We can no longer rely on our traditional employment patterns, more and more of our men are failing to find work. The eviction of Dale Farm has highlighted that there is still a battle for equality to be won. Engagement with education can lead Gypsys and Travellers to alternative careers. Perhaps in years to come we will be lawyers, teachers, journalists, government advisers, and politicians, but most importantly, perhaps we will have our own spokespeople and our own voice.

re: Dispatches - The Fight For Dale Farm

I've lost count of the amount of times I’ve heard the words “there's one law for you fucking gypo's and another law for the rest of us”. Indeed, when you are raised a Gypsy you often come face to face with many disgruntled locals who are not exactly happy that you have just set up home on their most precious playing field. I find it somewhat ironic that these are often the same people who produced a brood of overweight, xbox addicted children who have never used (and will never miss) a playing field in their lives, but I digress. The unauthorised use of these playing fields, village greens, car parks etc. by Gypsies and Travellers fuels a hostile response from locals who feel Gypsies and Travellers are given 'special treatment' by the government and indeed this was voiced several times by angry resident's throughout last night's Dispatches.

According to Dispatches there is a belief that the law favours Gypsies and Travellers and that a 'radical change' is needed. At present I am sat in my trailer which is located on unused farmland which is let to my family at an extortionately high price by the landowner (see daylight robbery). My electricity is powered by petrol, there is no mains supply, and I have access only to cold water. I have no address, my family cannot register to vote or apply for welfare assistance, and I cannot tell a soul where I live without fear that my family and I will be evicted and become homeless once more. It is safe to say that I honestly do not feel favoured by the law.

Perhaps the question I am asked most is simply 'why?'. Time and time again Gypsies and Travellers are asked why they don't take up the offer of bricks and mortar accommodation and this is a question that has been raised with the Irish Traveller's facing eviction at Dale Farm. My own experience of bricks and mortar accommodation is not a positive one. When my family were first offered accommodation by the local authority, it was a 3 bedroom, top floor flat in the middle of one of the most deprived housing estates in the city and in our desperation this became home to ten of us. 

 

While we were used to overcrowding and the lack of privacy, it was impossible for us to adapt from a life on the open road to a life in a concrete sky scraper, isolated from our community and extended family. The neighbourhood was characterised by drugs, prostitution, burglary, robbery etc. and this was a life that we had never contemplated, let alone experienced. On top of this, we were subjected to verbal and physical attacks because of our ethnicity, our property was vandalised (most notably 'gypo scum' was creatively written on our front door with faeces) and we were hounded from our home leading to our return to unauthorised encampments. The story is the same for a large majority of Gypsies and Travellers. We are offered unsuitable housing in deprived areas, where there is often a history of hostility towards our people. 

 

It is a well documented fact, one which last night's Dispatches picked up on, that there are not enough local authority provided sites to meet the needs of the Gypsy and Traveller population. This has led to the establishment of private sites on land owned by Gypsy's and Traveller's, however many of these sites, like Dale Farm, remain unauthorised due to planning permission being rejected. While I accept that remaining on unauthorised sites is illegal, it cannot be ignored that the planning system inherently discriminates against Gypsys and Travellers and as Noah Burton, owner of an unauthorised site in Meriden, said on last night's Dispatches, planning applications from Gypsy's and Traveller's are simply 'thrown out'. 

 

One statistic (that is currently being thrown about here, there and everywhere and thus I will reference it) shows that 90% of planning applications from Gypsy's and Traveller's are rejected by local authorities, compared to only 20% of applications from the non-Gypsy (or Gauja) population (Wilson, 1998). In my opinion this is due to the prejudiced views held by those who have the power to make these decisions - individuals who would rather bow down to the demands of the Daily Mail reading locals than make an educated and fair decision. It is due to this that Gypsys and Travellers often have no other choice but to live on unauthorised encampments. 

 

Last night's Dispatches brought up, on several occasions, some of the issues associated with unauthorised encampments – human waste and fly tipping. Believe you me, if I have a choice between a toilet or a bush I will most definitely choose the toilet. As hard as you may find it to believe, it is not the sole purpose of my existence to ruffle the feathers of local dog walkers by shitting in a bush. Poor waste management is unavoidable when Gypsy and Travellers have been left with no other choice but to set up unauthorised encampments on unsuitable land. There is a huge lack of temporary stopping sites and, in my experience, established holiday campsite's are extremely reluctant to take bookings from Gypsys and Travellers, indeed the words “sorry, no gypsies” could accurately sum up my summers. 

 

I wont condemn Dispatches' attempt at covering the issues surrounding Dale Farm, as while it made some truly insulting claims (particularly Brian Steele's theory that we all prey on vulnerable old people to con them out of their money), it did make an attempt, albeit a half arsed one, to show our side of the story for once. The Dale Farm eviction shouldn't be treated with simplicity, and it is time we started to look for a deeper understanding of this sad, desperate, and far from isolated situation.

Wilson, M (1998). A Directory of Planning Policies for Gypsy Site Provision in England. Bristol: Policy Press.