I’ve been at Woodside caravan park for a day and a bit now. I’ve not spent much time on a Gypsy site before. But there’s an air about the place which is familiar to me – it’s the air of a Traveller site, half deserted, half filled with people waiting for their eviction. Lots of families have left, worried and wary of the treatment they may receive from Mid Beds Council and it’s bailiffs. Some are still here, resisting eviction through the courts, local politics, barricades and stubbornness.
There are 27 plots here where, for the past five years, some seventy-five travelling families have been living, stopping, staying and passing through.
The place was bought by the Gypsies to provide a safe zone for their people to rest. They need somewhere from which they can access healthcare, basic utilities, education and work, in a world where essential services are geared exclusively for people who live in houses.
Government accuses Gypsies of being unwilling to “integrate”, of anti social behaviour, of bringing on crime waves. Here is one example of many travelling communities around Britain, who are trying to end the cycle of exclusion – deprivation – exclusivity, by compromising, bowing down to the law of land ownership and buying their own sedentary space. This is exactly what Tony Blair called for when Labour last came to power. However, Mid Beds’ Conservative led Council refuses to meet them half way. Instead, they are using their power to steal Woodside.
The site was bought with planning permission, granted in 1990, for a caravan park, with permanent residence for the warden, outbuildings and plots for a minimum of 152 caravans.
The man who applied for permission apparently had friends in the council and the planning department. Since the Gypsies have come, only erecting small garden sheds on their plots and asking to keep 54 caravans here, the council has tried everything it can to revoke permission. This includes lying to court, by claiming that the site is on a flood plain (since proven to be wrong). In fact, the 17 acre park is zone two development land, with five acres prime for building little brick houses on and hence worth £1million per acre! Unsurprisingly, the council will hit the owners of Woodside with such high fines that they can repossess the land in payment. In the end, all the gypsy families of Woodside will have bought for themselves is a £300,000 eviction.

The first round of evictions is starting. Come down today (Sunday 3rd November) or early tomorrow morning to lend your support to people living here. Show the council that it can’t get away unnoticed with it’s sneaky, racist tactics. Join us in saying no to this eviction.

Here is a poem written by Woodside resident,Janie Codona;
"Is anyone out there can they hear our prayer, the council are around us and prepare to seal our fate, they gather up their forces and to our home do congregate.
They bring with them strong men and monster of machines, to tear down our possessions and shatter all our dreams, what did we do to deserve this but buy a piece of ground, somewhere for us to come home to when we want a rest from moving around.
We are all gypsys from an ethnic race, who are persecuted by society and looked on in distaste, the council they are strong and high in numbers be, they try to take our right to be allowed to roam free. they threaten us with eviction from our own land, we Gypsys band together determined to make a stand, our courage knows no bounds, our strength we draw from within, we stand forward together so let the battle begin, because if we lose the mighty price we pay, is to be made homeless with nowhere for us to stay.
Is anybody out there, does anybody care."

For more info. call 01767 689 736, or email  codona9@aol.com.
To really find out what’s going on, get down here:-
From the A1 take the A603 towards Bedford.
Take the 2nd right, after the bridge (Hatch Rd.)
Take 1st right by the 30mph traffic sign.
You have arrived. If the barricade is up, give site a bell and say you’ve come down to