Mr. David Joyce:

I am certainly not aware of any, let us say, indigenous Irish groups. The reality is that groups in Ireland, and particularly new communities, are, by definition, ethnic groups in any event under our current law. Irrespective of whether ethnicity is based on nationality or based on religions and other factors, they are effectively ethnic groups under the law that exists. The concept of ethnicity is defined in the Equal Status Act - there are objective criteria which those groups meet. So there are numerous ethnic groups in Irish society. The distinction here is that we are talking about an indigenous community in Ireland which, in my personal belief and in any objective belief, fulfil the objective criteria to define an ethnic group. The public statements of the State effectively deny that.

One could ask what other ethnic groups we are talking about. We could talk about language groups. Could the people living in Gaeltacht areas suddenly say that, based on a language, they are an ethnic group? Possibly, but that is not a call. The point is that there are ethnic groups under the current legislation and certainly under objective criteria. However, Travellers being an indigenous Irish group seem to be the only group that seems to be denied that.