Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

TRAVELLER EVICTIONS

No Borders | 27.01.2004 14:34

article about the Bulkington and Meadowlands evictions

On Monday the 12th of January a Traveller camp in Bulkington, near Coventry was set to be evicted from land that was theirs by purchase and right. Nuneaton Council wanted the Travellers out, allegedly because their caravan site was on green belt land. However the field was still to all intents and purposes green, although the Travellers had spent thousands of pounds on water supply, a road and plots for different families. The Travellers said they believed the process of asking permission to live on their own land was doomed because of the council’s racism; indeed over 90% of all requests by Travellers to live on purchased land are turned down.

The night before the eviction ditches were dug around the site and barricades piled by the main gate. A truck was overturned across the entrance to the camp and tyres were ready to burn. When a dozen or so bailiffs turned up around sixty Travellers and a handful of supporters filled the road in front of the flaming barricades, forming a human barrier. The clearly outnumbered bailiffs called in the police for back up. With a banner that read “stop ethnic cleansing” the Travellers marched to the line of police shouting “prison first” and “we’ll fight for our land”. After the police decided that they were not willing to risk going into the camp in support of the bailiffs a spokeswoman from the council came and promised the council would reconsider the fact that they were making 150 people including 50 children homeless, without providing them any where to go.

The Bulkington caravan park is now safe from eviction until the conclusion of a judicial review bought by the Travellers to try to force the council to provide an alternative site if they insist on turning them off their own land. The Travellers argue that since their children have been attending school in the county for three years, they should be allowed to stay in the area and are willing to buy another piece of land if the council promises to allow them to live on it.

Racism in the Bulkington village towards the Travellers is common, with several local residents admitting to us that they wanted the “Gypoes” out of their area, “so they can go over the county border and be someone else’s problem” and apparently some of the Traveller children pretend not to be from the site at their local school in order to avoid attacks from other kids. This prejudice is intentionally stirred up by the council and the police. After the failed attempt to evict the Traveller community the police told all local businesses to close early as the Travellers would try to smash up their shops. The local residents that most easily saw through this falsehood were the farmers living next to the site that came out in support of the Travellers in the press as they had had enough contact to know what they were really like.

The “Battle of Bulkington” was the first success for the Traveller community in England in a long time. The government resented the media attention the Traveller community won so much that the next community to be evicted, Meadowlands in Chelmsford was raided by 70 riot police and 70 bailiffs on Monday the 26th of January. The Travellers tried to defend their home with barricades and non violent tactics, but the police and bailiffs stormed their land with a bulldozer and started to beat people and set alight to parts of the site. A small boy’s leg was badly hurt, as were a few of the activists trying to prevent the eviction.

It is typical of the state of the country we live in that legislation supposedly meant to protect our environment is being used against one of the most abused parts of our society. “Local residents”, living in brick and mortar, a far more permanent damage to our environment are supposed to be protected when the Travellers are booted out of their homes and their caravans put on the street with nowhere for them to go. Why is it that in Britain whether or not you have a right to a home depends on who you are and your right to live as you choose depends on what you choose? This is ethnic cleansing pure and simple. The problem for the government is not that the Travellers are living on land they are “preserving”, but that they are living within their own community outside the confines of state control. The government will not be happy until all Traveller communities are split up, housed in bricks and mortar and their way of life, social ties and community economy is completely destroyed. Don’t stand by while the government persecutes Travellers and whips up racist support, take action to show your support for the travelling community, come to their evictions, let the councils and bailiff firms know what you think.
Contact-  nooneisillegal2003@yahoo.co.uk


No Borders
- e-mail: nooneisillegal2003@yahoo.co.uk

Comments

Display the following 5 comments

  1. Nothing is Easy... — No Borders 2
  2. Cheers! — gerbilmark
  3. please, some more info — zed
  4. Traveller links — gerbilmark
  5. Sympathy's not enough — madmink
Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech