Gypsies and Travellers and Local Communities

Mike Wood Excerpts

Monday 9th October 2017 Commons Chamber

[Mike Wood (Dudley South) (Con)]

Everyone in the House will agree that members of our communities have a right to choose alternative ways of life, but none of them has the right to opt out of British law. When that breaks down, not only community cohesion but respect for the rule of law and those who represent the people affected break down as well.

Over the past three summers, there have been a number of Traveller camps in Dudley. Some of those camps, although unauthorised, have caused very little damage or disruption. Indeed, at least one group of travellers from Scandinavia tidied up after themselves, mowed the grass, and probably left the pitch in a better condition than they had found it in. Sadly, however, too many others have caused significant criminal damage and disruption to local communities. There have been illegal incursions in areas including Netherton, Woodside, Wordsley and Kingswinford. There has been defecation and urination on playing pitches and children’s playing areas. While the impact of that is, of course, felt most keenly by residents in the immediate area, the cost of dealing with it—in terms of enforcement and clearing up—is felt by the whole borough and has amounted to more than £150,000.

The reflex reaction is that the police need more powers, but there is rarely any suggestion of what those powers would look like, how they would be used and, indeed, whether they would be used. I certainly support giving the police new powers to deal with illegal Traveller camps, but I think that many of the reasons that are given for the fact that the police often seem to consider it inappropriate or unlawful to use section 61 powers because of the lack of welfare assessments and the needs of the children are likely to be applied to any such new powers. We need far clearer guidance, because there is enormous variation across the country, and often within police forces, in the way in which the section 61 powers are used. I look to the Minister, working with colleagues in the Home Office, to produce that clearer guidance on which councils and police forces can rely, so that they know when it is appropriate to use the powers that the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 appears to grant to police forces.

We need reform of how section 62A is structured, with regard to the area to which Travellers can be moved for a transit camp, and in how capacity is assessed, so that combined authorities can pool their capacity and the police can move unauthorised camps into transit camps, such as those being developed in Dudley.