Ms RoseMarie Maughan:

The most important thing I wish to say in raising the voice of autistic Travellers is that no policy or legislation should be developed, designed or implemented without their input. Otherwise we are doing an injustice to the voice of the most vulnerable, which is not being heard and has not been heard.

I agree with the good points that have been made about education. It must be a truly inclusive setting where Travellers are welcomed and celebrated. This applies across the board within the educational curriculum. Teachers should not be qualified as teachers unless they have undergone mandatory training on what it is to be autistic, what it is to be a Traveller, how these things impact on a child's life and how to appropriately teach that child.

I wish to make another very important point, picking up where Mr. de Bhairdúin left off on nomadism. As he rightly said, we are not able to move in any corner of this country, North or South. The 1995 task force on the Travelling community called for the development of 1,000 units of transient sites. Fewer than 50 have been developed. They are not used as transient sites. It is illegal to be a Traveller; it is illegal to travel. Therefore our culture has been eroded and wiped out, right under our noses, without meaningful consultation with us. If we do travel we are faced with evictions from pillar to post, from one corner to another. If we try to engage with the mainstream residential caravan parks we face discrimination. That is not even our culture. Our ethnicity was recognised on 1 March 2017. Let that mean something. Let that mean we can have our culture and we do not die without the right to be nomadic. Let us travel rightfully across the land of Ireland.