Travellers Fear Vigilante Tactics in Bundoran

national | rights, freedoms and repression | news report Thursday August 26, 2004 18:52 by Donegal Travellers Project - Donegal Travellers Project travcom at eircom dot net Letterkenny 074 9129281

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Donegal Travellers Project Management Committee was saddened by the events that occurred in Bundoran this summer. Secretary Angela O Leary said that she was disturbed by the thoughts that the settled community were organising themselves into large groups to intimidate children, women and members of her community, as they have done in Bundoran recently. “Do the people of Bundoran not know that there are no transient sites there and Travellers are often not let in anywhere else?, I also think that Travellers need to negotiate with local representatives where they can park in the absence of Transient sites so that nobodies rights are impinged”.

Donegal Travellers Project has repeatedly called for the provision of a transient site adjacent to, or as near to Bundoran as possible, to provide accommodation for nomadic Travellers that would contribute to alleviating the conflicts that happens every summer. Under the Accommodation Act 1998, the provision of transient accommodation for Travellers was instated in Irish legislation. It is the job of Donegal County Council officials and Councillors to work together to implement this legislation locally. DTP had repeatedly lobbied the Council and the elected representatives to meet their obligations as a matter of urgency before the situation became unmanageable in South Donegal. Donegal County Council have accepted the ethnicity and right of Travellers to be nomadic in their accommodation programme of 2000-2005, as they are obliged to under the equal status legislation.


Here in the Border Counties, if we have learned anything about conflict or cultural clashes, it is that violent and intimidatory responses are not the answer. The people who hold most of the power in terms of bringing about change are the settled community. We must bear in mind that the settled community have taken no constructive initiative to resolve the conflict that exists between them and the Traveller Community. The Traveller Community only receives the attention of the settled community when they become an irritant in some way, as has been described in recent articles in the Donegal Democrat. The deplorable conditions that Travellers live in and the inequalities between the communities is rarely taken on board by the “plumbers, publicans, amusement workers, musicians and councillors” as mentioned in Daniel Browne’s article.

Donegal Travellers Project recognises that work needs to be done by both communities to try and resolve this issue. We should all remember that Travellers are human beings. A Traveller child is as precious as anybody’s child. Travellers will continue to be nomadic, Travellers will continue coming to Donegal, Travellers will continue coming to Bundoran. So what are we going to do to learn to live side by side? Donegal Travellers Project is willing to enter into a process to look at how to improve the situation. This process may involve the establishment of a local Traveller/Settled Community Forum with the central aim of reconciliation. This is not something that will be achieved overnight. We are calling on the county council to be a leader in this process, but we are also asking journalists to note that when they make sweeping statements about an entire community they are fuelling racial tensions. Bundoran needs a transient site; the County Manager must accept his responsibility in providing accommodation for all.