Ms Rachel Mullen:

In terms of the key moment in the renewal of policies and strategies, the core one is the national pathways to work strategy, which is under the auspices of the Department of Social Protection. That was to be published just before Covid hit but that has yet to happen. It is possibly being rewritten in light of the likely significant employment problem that will result from the pandemic.

A key moment in that policy was that it was pivoting more towards the pillar of active inclusion on the basis that we had practically full employment just before Covid hit. There is a real opportunity to have Travellers named as a core target group in that strategy. It is critical that they would be named in a mainstream strategy such as that one because the danger is that things get siloed over to the national Traveller-Roma integration strategy. Travellers need to be named in mainstream strategies.

The national social enterprise policy is also, we understand, about to be reviewed. There is an opportunity there to specifically name Travellers and to look at tailored supports for those Travellers who want to start their own enterprises.