Mr. Thomas McCann:

I thank the committee for inviting me to present to it. It is good to see so many people who have been involved over the years in Traveller issues and supporting the Traveller community.

The Traveller community is one of the most disadvantaged groups in Ireland and has been for decades, if not centuries - in terms of unemployment, poverty, social exclusion, health status, infant mortality, life expectancy, illiteracy, formal education and mental health. The joint committee, which will meet later, acknowledged in its report that the Traveller community is suffering a mental health crisis due to many different factors. This is backed up by other statistics, such as the behaviour and attitudes survey, which found that 90% of Travellers were affected by mental health problems. Some 82% of Travellers have been affected by suicide, with 26% affected by suicide within their immediate family. I believe the figures are much higher now than they were when these statistics were collated in 2017. The all-Ireland Traveller health study, which was launched recently, indicated that 11% of all Traveller deaths were caused by suicide. There are more statistics to back this up. I will not go through them all.

The Traveller Counselling Service is involved in many initiatives, including counselling with Dóchas. More than half of the clients who present to us are suffering with addiction. Drug use within the Traveller community has become a significant issue in the past ten or 15 years. In the mid to late 1990s, a dipstick survey of Traveller drug use was done concerning serious drugs. A handful of Travellers were using addiction services. Now, more than 60% of people who present to addiction services are Travellers. This figure comes from reports and shows the increase in Traveller drug use. This is a high proportion compared with other drug users.

Aside from hard drugs, we also need to consider prescribed medications. There is an overprescription of medication in the Traveller community. Reports have shown this time and again. There are also drugs that are not taken into account in this discussion, such as nicotine and alcohol. We need to consider the whole spectrum of drug use.

As Mr. Collins stated, the rise in drug use is connected to a number of factors. Statistics show that there is more than 60% unemployment in the Traveller community, but the community believes this is much higher at 70% or 80%. There is also overcrowding and inadequate accommodation. For decades, local authorities did not draw down money from the Traveller accommodation budget. They have done so more recently, but most of that budget is being spent on refurbishments and not new builds. There is a lack of proper facilities in Traveller accommodation. The increase in homelessness adds to this scenario. There is limited access to education, particularly for younger Travellers. Mr. Brian Harvey produced a report showing the cuts in the Traveller sector since 2008. For example, Traveller training centres were all scrapped and there was nothing to replace them. All of those young people had nothing else to go back to. We can see the impact of this on younger Travellers alongside the systemic discrimination and racism experienced by Travellers in general.

Travellers face difficulties in accessing addiction services. For example, there is a lack of outreach in their communities. There needs to be an expansion of the one or two initiatives where there is engagement by addiction services with the community and supports can be linked into, be those detox or other services. The social determinants need to be examined. Younger people are falling into addiction because of a lack of support structures in terms of employment, education and training. The few small initiatives that are under way are welcome, but we need to do more. I welcome the National Traveller and Roma Inclusion Strategy II 2024-2028 – Deputy Stanton headed up the previous strategy and now a new one is in place – but it unfortunately does not mention anything about drug use. This is a gap. We need to ensure that there are targeted initiatives for Travellers. It has been shown time and again that, where it is part of a larger strategy, the Traveller community gets lost unless there are specific elements dealing with it and the playing pitch is levelled a little. A national drug strategy, addiction strategy or whatever we want to call it that focuses on the Traveller community and addresses some of the gaps is needed.

Otherwise we are going to fall behind and it is going to get worse. Unfortunately, that is the case.

There are a couple of things regarding resourcing for local and national Traveller organisations to address some of these issues. They are struggling for resources. As was said earlier, we need to support the development of proper strategies to engage with the community. We need the implementation of an ethnic identifier in all services provided to ascertain the level of engagement and issues people are coming in with across services. There are issues in some areas with that, however, we need development of culturally inclusive services, which is sadly missing from many services. That is not just addiction services, as we said, but also in the mental health and health services and others. There is a need for culturally appropriate and inclusive services to be developed. With regard to youth diversion programmes and so on, they need to be culturally appropriate. They need to be looked at through a culturally appropriate lens. It is not a one-size-fits-all for communities. We need to look at what the specific needs of different communities, including disadvantaged working-class communities because one size does not fit all.

We also want awareness programmes developed for and by the community. There are national and local groups trying to do this but it is difficult for them to address all the issues. While we are involved in counselling and mental health, we are also involved in a whole range of other issues, as are many other groups. They are struggling because there is a crisis within the community. There is not just one crisis but numerous crises. The drugs problem, however, is a crippling issue for the community. It was said that if the rise in the use of crack cocaine takes hold within the community, we could be looking at a similar issue to what happened to the north inner city when heroin first appeared, particularly among the Traveller community.

It is crucial that we take this on board and recognise there is a need for a specific targeted initiative that is addressed at a national level and brings all the players together, both the addiction services, the Traveller community and drug users to see how we can structure services that meet the needs of the community. I will leave it there and will answer any questions.