Gypsies have 'no choice' (From Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard)

Gypsies have 'no choice'

GYPSIES who claimed they settled in Minety because they had nowhere else to go, already had a mobile home on a legal site in Gloucestershire, a public inquiry has heard.

During the four-day hearing at North Wiltshire District Council's Chippenham offices last week, it was revealed one family chose to move onto the site, despite having had a mobile home in Westbury on Severn since 1988.

Shaun Lamb was one of five gypsies to give evidence at the inquiry and admitted his mother and father, two sisters and brother all lived on the site while retaining their previous home.

The revelation contradicted the claim by the Minety group that they had to buy the land and set up the illegal camp because they had nowhere else to go.

David Fletcher, the barrister for North Wiltshire District Council, asked 19-year-old Mr Lamb: "Why is there no mention of the other home the family has in the Forest of Dean?"

Mr Lamb, who bought the Minety plot for £520, replied: "I didn't think it was relevant", before adding, "It's not big enough for what we want.

"We are a close family and we want to be together, but it's not big enough."

The inquiry into whether the gypsies should be allowed to stay on the sitein Minety they have occupied since August 2003 heard evidence from numerous witnesses.

North Wiltshire MP James Gray acknowledged more permanent sites needed to be provided nationally for gypsies, before adding: "People of a nomadic way of life should obey the same planning law as everybody else.

"The law applies to everyone, irrespective of who they are."

Maggie Smith-Bendall, spokesman for the Romany Gypsy Council, said the families had no choice because a loss of common land and government restrictions on stopping on open land meant they could find nowhere else to settle.

"There are no sites in this country. Successive governments since the 1960s have been sweeping my people under the carpet," she said.

She added that a proposal to move the Minety families to a permanent site in Thingley, near Chippenham, if should they lose the appeal was unsuitable.

Tension and incompatibility between the predominantly Irish travellers occupying the site and Romany gypsies meant the move would lead to confrontation, added Mrs Smith-Bendall.

Minety Parish Council chairman David Brown told the inquiry: "If this application is finally granted it would undermine, perhaps critically, that acceptance of rule by consent where planning in concerned.

"This would have far reaching affects, not only in our village, but right across the country."

The hearing heard from Verina Hyland, who lives next to the gypsy camp and is chairman of Minety Action Group, which has fought the development since it happened.

She spoke of intimidation from the site's occupants, rubbish being thrown onto her land and of the road danger posed by the vehicular entrance to the site, which is on the bend of a busy road.

"I can confirm that my life and my enjoyment of my home and amenity has been severely damaged by what is happening to me day after day," she said.

Planning inspector Andrew Kirby, who chaired the inquiry, will now write a report and pass it to the Secretary of State, John Prescott, who will make a judgement in about 16 weeks time.