Mr. Bernard Joyce:

I wish to re-emphasise some of the points we made earlier. Given that so many people are so far removed from the justice system and they cannot access the justice system, they feel the justice system is against them. That can be seen in access to services and goods. In the Traveller community when somebody dies, the community comes together. Whole towns, pubs and hotels close. It is horrendous that this can happen in 2021. It causes trauma, pain and hurt. People who are coming home to small towns and, in some cases, cities cannot take recourse of action. I do not know if any other community has experienced that. It really affects the community.

In addition, that gives a kind of a message of access going against the hope and aspiration of where we should be as a society. People should have access to services under anti-discrimination legislation. That is what I was highlighting earlier. In addition, we have the criminal trespass legislation. If an Irish Traveller is in movement it is a criminal offence. They are being criminalised for being a nomadic ethnic group. As members will know, Travellers were formally recognised as an ethnic group in 2017 by Dáil Éireann. However, legislative changes did not come with that. We still cannot travel on this island, nor do we have any recourse to action on this island when threatened with evictions from public lands across the country.

Many families are living in overcrowded, substandard poor living conditions. In our submission, the Irish Traveller Movement asked for a special independent service to address that and give the support that is needed. That needs to be supported with State resources to give confidence to the community that people are entitled to access the services in a culturally appropriate way. Currently that is not there.

I encourage the committee members to read the submission we submitted. It is really valuable in terms of what we recommended. I would be very happy to go back to any members or to any departmental officials after today's committee hearing. I again thank the committee members for giving us the opportunity to present and discuss the matter which was very helpful.