Mr. Bernard Joyce:

I thank Deputies and Senators for the opportunity to present to the committee today. This is a timely discussion given that Ireland is preparing its fifth State report to the Council of Europe under the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities which was ratified in 1999. Travellers are recognised by the State under this treaty which sets out rights and complementary obligations. Article 5 deals with promoting the conditions necessary to maintain and develop Traveller culture and the preservation of Traveller identity in areas of religion, language, traditions and cultural heritage. Article 14 recognises Travellers' right to learn their own language and Article 15, among other things, requires the State to create the conditions for the effective participation in cultural life. The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights has similar protections, as does the UNESCO Convention, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the UN Convention of the Rights of the Child. Before we address the committee's theme of local focuses, it is important to look at how those matters might be supported at a national level.

The development of local and community arts to ensure Traveller inclusion is absent from a centralised national strategy with ring-fenced funding. This would give direction and authority to localised community arts to be more inclusive and targeted in their plans, funding schemes and outcomes. A number of related actions were included in the National Traveller and Roma Inclusion Strategy 2017-2021, but it too had no ring-fenced moneys or a leading Department to drive them on. In 2022 Creative Ireland was tasked to support the successor strategy, due in 2024, which is reassuring but there is no engagement on how that will happen.

It is notable that the Arts Council in its discussion with the committee this month recognised that barriers persist to growing and diversifying audiences. The council said that it is committed to breaking new ground. While a welcome recent focus on gender and disability is noted, there are no dedicated Traveller funded schemes and bursaries and no ethnic equality monitoring metrics applied to Arts Council or Creative Ireland funding streams. This would help better targeting and monitoring. We support the recommendation of the National Campaign for the Arts for the commissioning of research into diversity in the arts and the creation of a diversity task force to address any obstacles.

Up to 2022, national and local Traveller organisations were not resourced to work in the area, with one position created since then. Elevating and making visible Traveller culture and heritage has a role in combatting racism and discrimination but this is not being considered enough. National cultural institutions and arts authorities, as allies, protectors and funding guardians, are critical to how we preserve and elevate Traveller life and history in the national consciousness and story, and how we work towards correcting historic cultural erosion.

Planning and designing ways in which Travellers can enjoy and participate fully in cultural rights should be underpinned by dialogue with the community on what that looks like. For example, each national cultural institution might develop a Traveller community engagement strategy and individual action plans which link to a centralised action plan for all national Traveller collections and to localised plans. Public art could be more diverse to reflect the Traveller voice and visibility in its designs and content.

Travellers were not evident in the broad consultation informing the five-year Culture and Creativity Strategy 2017 – 2022, and benefitted from only a very small number of projects noted in the €6.6 million allocated in 2022. The procedure for accessing the fund-through local authority community or county arts offices is problematic for Travellers, where systemic discrimination is ingrained. Traveller participation in local tourism, heritage and the arts settings through active targeting onto boards, committees and decision-making forums, would be welcome, as would a fund for Traveller community arts workers, nationally and locally. Anti-racism and cultural competency training for arts staff across bodies and locations is needed. We would welcome more discussion with the committee on the matters raised in our submission. We have also submitted a list of further recommendations to the committee for its consideration.