Here’s my problem: if someone tried to kick me out of my home and knock it down I’d tell them to fuck right off. As, I’m sure, would Tony Ball, leader of Basildon council. So, quite why it comes as a surprise that those living on the Dale Farm site don’t want to move after 10 years, I really don’t know.
It’s true that there is no planning permission for building on the site. It is also true that around half the site lies on land that’s designated as green belt. These two facts count for little however when you know that the entire site was a scrapheap (this is certainly not how to preserve green belt land) and that around 60% of sites without planning permission are approved retrospectively. Even more shocking is the fact that around 80% of planning applications are approved immediately. Only around 20% of applications from traveller communities are approved at all.
Dale Farm is only an illegal site on account of these two issues. It’s entertaining to think that at it’s core, the government’s current planning reforms which the National Trust so vehemently oppose will probably make a mockery of Tony Ball’s attempts to evict a group of relatively peaceful and good natured travellers.
It will also make a mockery of the £18 million that Basildon council have spent on their attempt to evict the Dale Farm community. To put this into perspective – Basildon council is cutting it’s disability support service by £505,000 a year. The amount the council has spent on this eviction could pay for this service for about 9 years.
We’ve seen that a lot of the facts about the Dale Farm site create morally and factually dubious grounds for this eviction – I can’t see any of Dale Farm’s neighbours being particularly fond of living beside a scrapheap either. So, exactly why Basildon council are still attempting to evict the Dale Farm site leads me to believe that this is an attack on a community and a culture. Because as we all know, gypsies and travellers steal our telephone cables, don’t pay tax, destroy land, eat puppies, worship the devil and regularly steal from homeless people. It’s these ridiculous prejudices that have created a culture which discriminates against travellers and other minorities. It’s a culture of fear and misunderstanding. It’s this culture that we have to target if we want to get rid unfair evictions, extremist groups and racism.
This doesn’t mean branding those who support the eviction as fascists and leaving them to it. It does nothing for us in the long run. They’ll pass on their views and the problem remains and increases. Our job, as reasonable and sensible people is to inform and explain the facts. This holds just as firm whether we’re talking about EDL sympathisers or religious fanatics. The majority of people who support the evictions do so on the basis of prejudice and the belief that it’s “people like these” who have created the bad position that we’re in as a country. This logic sounds familiar when I remember talking to a woman on the EDL march a couple of weeks ago who told me she supported the EDL because her son couldn’t get into university because, she believed, they were full up with Muslims and other immigrants. The simple facts are that there is a shortage of university places because we have an enormous amount of young people with a lot of aspiration. This is something to be celebrated, but also something that needs to be catered for. Instead, the consequences have been used to fuel somebody’s hate.
We have travellers because that’s their culture, not because they’re trying to con the state. What a lot of people forget is that travellers do pay council tax when living on authorised sites. The Dale Farm site is not authorised, so travellers there can’t pay council tax. They most likely would do so if the council would agree to authorise it; once again, Basildon council losing money because of their obsession with breaking up a community.
Many travellers do have jobs – in fact there are quite a few travelling communities that travel because of their jobs (for instance road construction workers) and therefore pay income tax (assuming they’re over the tax threshold). They are as much members of the community and way-paying citizens as the rest of us.
If Dale Farm is evicted, it will be a shame, and absolutely devastating for the community. But it will not be the end. The campaign for the rights of minorities will go on. I don’t think people are fundamentally full of hate. I think people look for someone to blame when things go wrong. They wrong people. That’s how groups like the EDL flourish. That’s why the travelling community have been targeted for generations. These people should be called out on their ignorance but not alienated and allowed to continue. Campaigning for equality is about getting people on the same side, not creating an opposition. There will always be a few fundamental extremists, but with nobody to follow them they’re nothing.
What doesn't help is when our politicians come out and say that they agree with the evictions. Only last week, Harriet Harman told us all that she thinks the Dale Farm site should be evicted, along with Priti Patel and Vince Cable on BBC Question Time. When a government and the opposition both support throwing families out of their home for no apparent reason, it's time to be shocked. When small state libertarians who traditionally think the idea of planning laws are an infringement on freedom agree with the evictions, then there are serious questions to be asked.
If you're not already asking those questions, it's probably time to start.
