After the radio interview …

BBC Surrey Breakfast Show, Saturday 12 October 

Thanks to local councillor @PaulDeach who listened to my interview live and reacted immediately, this interview is put into context as a more permanent podcast on the Surrey Heath Residents' Blog.
And on iTunes  

( http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/player/p01hg328 
no longer available on BBC website)
 

Speaking live on an early morning radio programme can be deceptively challenging. Firstly, you have to be awake! Then, for example, before sun-up and in the rain, negotiating the Pirbright bends, where the road is strewn with branches and massive surprise puddles, you strive to get to the Guildford BBC studios in time for your precise slot.

Also there is the sensitive nature of the topic. Travellers. Gypsies. Planning applications and prejudice. Yes, enough to wake anyone up when presented with a list of alleged crimes and anti-social behaviour that are, apparently, solely attributable to Gypsies and Travellers.

Thankfully such sweeping allegations against the travelling community are becoming fewer in the wider population. I think so, anyway, but there are always a few who refuse to see them as human beings, in most ways just the same as anyone else. The key difference is that some GandTs wish to retain aspects of their culture, with regard to moving around for work and social gatherings, and pursuing traditional ways of earning a living: tree surgery, garden maintenance, fencing etc; laying tarmac (less so now); scrap metal. This type of work would not fit easily on your average residential estate or road, and it is entirely right that they should be accorded somewhere for them to fulfil their role and pitch a trailer. This is really all they ask for; somewhere within reasonable reach of schools, shops, doctors and so on.

These people are descendants of those Romany Gypsies who years ago co-existed quite comfortably within the context of rural England, making things like pegs and baskets, virtually out of fresh-air and the hedgerow, or offering a useful service such as knife-grinding. Travelling and stopping has become nearly impossible, with so many laws that make this and doorstep selling difficult; now, even remaining static in their family groups is almost as impossible!

Local authorities are trying to do their bit, I feel, but as ever, once they do their assessments, find a suitable plot of land, which is not easy to say the least, the big hitch in the process is the general public’s resentment. Whilst acknowledging the need for site provision, there is still a strong element of NIMBYISM.

How about we all try and turn things around? Instead of dwelling on possible negatives, perhaps, for the sake of their children and grandchildren especially, we should do our bit to accentuate the positive.

‘Hey!  I hear some Romany Gypsy or Irish Traveller families are settling in near us! I would so like to know more about them and their fascinating culture first-hand. What you see on TV and read in the papers is probably not a fair representation. I shall make a real effort to make them welcome and help them fit in with our community. I’m dying to find out about what the older members can remember of times gone by!’

You can compose your own version of course.

Do some follow-up comments come along from the listening public? (I am still listening to the programme, so watch this space...!)
POST SCRIPT: No, apparently there was little negative response this time, for whatever reason.