Gypsies and Travellers and Local Communities — House of Commons, 2017-10-09
Topic: Law and Crime
Ian Austin (Labour, Centre-left): I have no criticism at all of the law-abiding majority who live by the rules and make a positive contribution to our communities, but I am here today to speak up on behalf of residents in Dudley, who have had to put up with illegal and antisocial camps this summer, as in previous years Parks and public open spaces have all been used for illegal encampments. Gates have been broken and bollards removed to access the sites. Residents and their kids have been unable to use community facilities and parks. Vehicles have been driven in a dangerous and antisocial way, destroying the environment and putting local people at risk, as well as the Travellers and their children. Some of the sites have been left with huge amounts of rubbish and waste, including in some cases, unbelievably, human waste in children’s play areas. This is completely unacceptable, and I want the council and the police to be able to deal with such sites much more quickly. I also want the council to take much stronger measures to prevent them from being occupied in the first place Earlier, I mentioned the work done on this by our police and crime commissioner, David Jamieson, who is urging MPs to back stronger powers to tackle unauthorised Traveller encampments. In place of the vague talk of reviews and all the rest of it, he has concrete proposals, which I hope a group of MPs and the PCC will be able to come and talk to Ministers about For example, at the moment the police can only direct difficult travelling groups to a transit site within a council area. Council borders are administrative, and a change in the law to allow the police to direct groups to transit sites in the wider area would be fairer and more effective. Our PCC believes that banning those responsible for repeated criminal activity from the whole of the area for specified short periods would be a serious deterrent, because there is currently no easy way to stop an antisocial group travelling between and within each local council area until it is moved on. Indeed, for a number of the parks subject to such activity in my constituency this summer, it was just one group being moved from one site to another, a few hundred yards or half a mile away. The process repeated itself throughout the summer, at enormous cost and hassle for local people, the council and the police Our PCC is calling for better protection for businesses and private land by changing the law to protect private landowners from being repeat victims of unauthorised encampments. He also wants sanctions made available for groups that return to the same private land and reductions in the time taken for evictions. He believes that injunctions should be available to cover larger areas than the specific individual site covered at the moment. Finally, he believes there should be more temporary or transient sites made available—Dudley actually has permanent sites available for the travelling community—so that Travellers can be moved on more quickly from local community facilities. I accept, as I said at the outset, that it is a minority of the travelling community who cause problems, and I am sure that it is just as frustrating for the majority. However, it is my job to speak up for people in Dudley who have been affected by these camps. What my constituents have had to put up with this summer, as in previous years, is completely and utterly unacceptable, and they and I want tougher and swifter action to deal with them.