Progress on housing Travellers is uneven, says report

Local authorities should stop using anti-trespass legislation against Travellers who are on their housing waiting-lists, a Government report, due to be published in the next fortnight, will recommend.

The report, from the National Traveller Accommodation Consultative Committee (NTACC), also says the establishment of a national body to monitor progress by local authorities in providing Traveller accommodation should be examined.

Compulsory purchase orders should also be used to secure land to provide Traveller accommodation.

Chaired by former TD and minister of state Mr Chris Flood, the NTACC comprises representatives from the Department of the Environment, the Department of Justice, local authorities, Travellers groups, councillors and a social worker.

The NTACC reports to the Minister for Housing, Mr Noel Ahern.

The report, due to published "in the next couple of weeks", is a review of the operation of the 1998 Housing (Traveller Accommodation) Act.

That Act mandated every local authority to draw up a five-year Traveller accommodation programme, to run from 1999. Though the deadline for implementing these programmes passed last month, none of the local authorities have delivered their programme in full.

Some 12 per cent (788) of the total number of Traveller families (6,799) in the State are living by the side of the road or on illegal sites.

The report notes a sense that "Traveller accommodation programmes were often aspirational documents, strong on intentions but weak on specifics".

It says progress in providing accommodation "has varied as between local authorities", adding that "a number have succeeded in making progress in providing accommodation".

It noted difficulties for local authorities in acquiring "affordable land" for Traveller accommodation and securing agreement from local residents.

However, it also says "the issue of land per se has not historically been as significant an impediment to progress in providing accommodation for Travellers".

"The sub-committee agrees that the compulsory purchase procedure should be used where the local authority considers it the best option," it says.

On unauthorised encampments, the committee heard that the 2002 anti-trespass legislation was considered by some local authorities and the Department of the Environment as an effective way of dealing with these camps.

The report, however, recommends that local authorities should "as far as practicable not request the gardaí to use their powers to remove families who are on local authority lands and are awaiting accommodation from the (same) local authority".

It was pointed out that some Traveller families have lost their place on their local authority's accommodation list when they have been forced to move on from an illegal site to another outside that authority's catchment area.

The committee also considered the establishment of a dedicated agency to force local authorities to deliver Traveller accommodation. It was pushed by representatives for Travellers but was resisted by Department and local authority representatives.

A consensus was reached, however, on recommending that if such a national agency was not established, "in the context of the level of progress being made in the implementation of programmes, an expansion of the role of the NTACC" should be examined to "improve the rate of accommodation provision".

The report finds the number of Traveller families accommodated by local authorities increased by 59 per cent between 1996 and 2003. Some 1,885 families were accommodated in this period. The highest proportion (46 per cent) were accommodated in standard housing, with 27 per cent accommodated in halting sites.