BASILDON BOROUGH Council in Essex insisted last night that it will begin the eviction of hundreds of Irish Travellers from a caravan site outside the town early today, despite efforts by the Travellers and protesters to barricade the lands.
The main gate to the Dale Farm camp has been heavily barricaded, while Travellers and others used a drawbridge to gain entry during the course of the day – but it was raised several times when bailiffs were visible as they made last-minute preparations for today’s actions.
Two cars have been wedged behind the gate, while supporters of the Travellers mixed concrete for much of yesterday afternoon as they sought to increase the defences further. A Russian military truck lies further behind.
Even though up to 200 people are to be evicted from Dale Farm, few of them were visible yesterday, while the numbers of supporters occupying “Camp Constant” – a camp within a camp – are significantly down on the numbers present when eviction loomed in September.
A meeting between Travellers and Basildon council in the morning broke down after 10 minutes, though the council insisted it had been called only to discuss health and safety issues, and was not a last-minute negotiation.
“This meeting was never going to be a negotiation about if or when, it was about how. And this was made very clear when the meeting was arranged. We now believe that those who want to leave peacefully have already done so and those who are left have made it clear that they have no intention of co-operating with the council,” said Tony Ball, Conservative leader of Basildon council.
“Resistance and violence as some are now suggesting will be in nobody’s interest – especially not the Travellers or their families.
“We now must get on with the difficult job of clearing Dale Farm in as safe and dignified a manner as possible – and that is what we will now do,” Mr Ball said.
Privately, council officials made clear that action would begin shortly after dawn.
One of the residents, Margaret McCarthy, insisted that the bailiffs would be resisted when they arrive. The caravans on the site would be moved back and forth between the 51 plots.
“They have the money to spend on this, so we are going to force them to spend it.
"We tried to get off the road as they told us to do and they wouldn't do anything for us," she told The Irish Times.
Moving the caravans between pitches, she said, would force the council to issue 28-day eviction notices again, though this is rejected by the council, which insists that it has been given clearance, subject to restrictions, to remove most of the Travellers from the illegally-developed portion of Dale Farm. A number will be allowed to stay, though, because of problems with enforcement notices.
Last night, there were suggestions that the council had asked permission of local landowners to cross their lands to enter Dale Farm from a number of points in a bid to stop the Travellers and supporters preventing heavy equipment such as JCBs and diggers from entering to begin the operation, which will take up to eight weeks to complete at a cost of up to £18 million (€20 million) between security, bailiffs and other costs.
The council’s ambitions to return the lands to green-belt status have been frustrated because some properties built during the 1990s when the land was used as a scrapyard cannot be touched. Equally, fences and walls built by the Travellers over the last decade cannot be removed and those damaged during the evictions will have to be repaired, to comply with the court ruling.
Some of the more than 50 supporters of the Travellers, most of whom wear balaclavas as they go around the camp, could be seen last night breaking bricks to use as missiles today, while large stores of timber have also been put aside. The Travellers’ youngest children would not be on the land this morning, though teenagers would remain, said Mrs McCarthy.
