Mr. Michael O'Neill:

I thank the Deputy for her questions. In relation to the ethnic identifier, we understand the Minister of State, Deputy Peter Burke, is bringing forward that through the programme board to do with the expert group. To our mind that does not require legislative change but a change to the application forms with all the necessary GDPR protections around it. We would welcome an early resolution of that matter and understand it is moving forward. It should be done while preserving really clearly the very specific reason this information is being collected and preserving the privacy of the individuals beyond that.

On the private sector, as Mr. McCann said, there is the recourse to the WRC and we have taken cases of this nature. The other part that belies is that oftentimes our experience, certainly from the equality reviews, is that individuals from the Traveller community are looking at the private rental sector because they do not have another realistic immediate choice. Thus, even if an individual succeeds in getting a tenancy from the private sector it will not necessarily be culturally appropriate. All the other aspects like the size of the property, the ability to live close to family or the prospect of having some space to maintain other aspects of their cultural heritage simply are not realistic in that context. There is a bigger issue in this context, which comes back to the original point Ms Gibney was making, which is that it is about the true preference. Oftentimes, even where an individual from the Traveller community secures private rented accommodation it is not the real solution to the problem at hand.