Ms Tracey Reilly:

I want to address the point on expectations within the school system. To be honest, unfortunately, on a personal level, there was no expectation for me from the teachers when I was in school. If there was, I would not have dropped out and would have stayed in. I was told that I was not going to get anywhere and that was basically why I dropped out of school straight away.

There is also the point about encouragement from Traveller parents. I am going to be brutally honest. My mother and father came from very similar experiences as me. They were literally dragged out. Within a classroom of however many pupils, they were brought down to be washed and brought back up and left in school. They thought the very same thing was happening to me when I came back and told them what the teacher said. Parents should know that their children are going to be respected for who they are, and I am not just talking about Travellers but about all minority groups. There is still racism and discrimination out there today. My nephew is only eight years old and had just started back in school and pupils aged eight were telling him them he was living in a halting site.

He was being told he lived on a smelly halting site and that was why he was not at the online classes, as his family could not afford Wi-Fi. That was not the fact. My sister lives on an authorised halting site, had no access to Wi-Fi and did not have the equipment for Wi-Fi. If she did, she has low literacy skills, with no IT skills or anything like that to support or help him. It is great that some schools do not experience any levels of racism but it is still present in 2021.