National and Local Traveller Organisations suspended our participation within the National Traveller Accommodation Consultative Committee and Local Traveller Accommodation Consultative Committees in November 2015.

This decision was taken due to the tragic events in Carrickmines on the 10th October 2015 with the loss of 10 life’s 5 young adults and five children:

  • Traveller organisations have participated in these structures, in good faith and with full commitment, since their establishment in 1998. Despite a series of plans agreed jointly to tackle the very serious accommodation issues faced by Travellers, there has been no meaningful progress towards achieving these plans to-date.
  • As organisations representative of the Traveller community, we are seriously concerned about this situation and about the serious implications for the health and wellbeing of our community. The loss of lives in Carrickmines has reminded many of us of the ultimate price that has been and continues to be paid for such failure to deal with critical accommodation conditions.
  • The failure of plans to address very serious accommodation needs has never been acknowledged, and there is no mechanism through which relevant institutions of the state can be held to account and sanctioned for this failure.

Members of both local and national Traveller organisations have found it increasingly difficult to justify their continued involvement and association with existing structures, especially to our own people. We as National and Local Traveller organisations believed there was a need to review and take stock at this stage. As organisations we are constantly in touch with members of our own community and we have a responsibility and a duty to reflect the real views of the Traveller community.

All National and Local Traveller Organisations jointly convened a series of review meetings.

Our agreed joint position towards both the NTACC and LTACCs is as follows:

  1. We recognise the State’s failure to meet the accommodation needs of Travellers in an culturally appropriate way, however in spite of this failure Traveller representative are prepared to engage with the accommodation structures at local and national levels.
  2. Traveller organisations will continuously review and monitor our engagement with the NTACC/LTACC to ensure that Traveller participation is not taken for granted. Ultimately what is needed in an independent Traveller Agency with implementation powers, which will bring about real change for the Traveller community and we will continue to campaign for this.

All national and local Traveller organisations are now committed to pursuing this joint strategy.

Published: 04 February 2016