Denis Landy (Labour) | Oireachtas source

In order to be helpful I will keep my contribution brief. I respect the fact that the last speaker has spoken with great passion and I commend her on her speech.

I want to divide my time into two sections. First, I will talk specifically about the report that the Minister has brought to us. Second, I shall talk on the broader issue.

I welcome the report. I appreciate that the Minister and the other people involved in its compilation have done a lot of work. Having said that, there are obvious deficiencies.Will the Minister respond to some of these points in his reply? As only 42% of remedial steps were implemented, will he explain the reason the remaining remedial steps were not implemented?

In regard to smoke alarms, 81% of accommodation units were appraised and 77% were supplied with smoke alarms. As is the norm in mainstream local authority housing - where the local authority has an input into the provision of the units - I would have thought the provision of a smoke alarm would be compulsory. I fully understand the concerns of people with regard to smoke alarms in Traveller accommodation. Will the Minister address that issue? The report states there was extensive discussion on smoke alarms and while a smoke alarm will assist in all practical senses, there is resistance to installing one and I ask the Minister to address that issue. A key recommendation is to change the code of practice under the provisions of the Fire Services Act 1981 and the 2003 amending Act and I ask the Minister to implement that change.

I know the Minister has a great interest in this issue, but in his opening statement he stated the statistics here are low with "six deaths per 1 million of population". With respect, Minister, no death is acceptable. I acknowledge the Minister accepts this but that statistic, with parts of the report not implemented, means there is a great deal more work to be done.

I will now deal with the broader issue of Traveller accommodation. When I went to primary school in the Mercy school in Carrick-on-Suir, I sat alongside a Traveller in my first year, which was known as low babies. That Traveller remained in school with me up until fifth class in primary school. The family then left. They had been living in a canvass tent in the field next to the castle in Carrick-on-Suir. I wonder how that boy ever got on in life after that. What chance did he have, compared with the chances I got?

I fundamentally disagree with Senator Boyhan's comment that we should recentralise the responsibility for Traveller accommodation. I commend Senator Coffey on what he said today. I totally agree with him when he said this was an abdication. We have 949 elected councillors. One of their responsibilities is to deal with Traveller accommodation. They must deal with the issue in the same way as they deal with other issues as elected representatives and not hand back that control to the Minister or to an official in the Department. In 2002, in my capacity in a previous job, I had an opportunity to train Traveller women for their role when they were on the Traveller accommodation committees in County Tipperary. I was a member of the council at the time. I got an insight into the issues they faced on a daily basis. Their input into the committee was extremely successful, not because of my training but because of their interest in representing their community on the committee. I met the then chairman of the council, now deceased, at a funeral and he told me about the Traveller accommodation committee meeting he had attended that day. He was bowled over by the Traveller women on the committee. I will never forget his line when he said "I cannot handle those women". Obviously I did not tell him that I had trained them but it showed me that if the Travelling community get an opportunity, they will engage in what we would call the mainstream.

I am aware of a former councillor in Senator Coffey's county of Waterford who took up the position of chairman of the Traveller accommodation committee. When he was asked at the time why he took the position of chairman, his answer was it was to make sure there were no Travellers in his local area. He said he would keep them out of his area. If we still have that attitude, we must deal with it. The Minister has to deal with this bigotry head on. Senator Coffey also mentioned briefly but did not develop a point I will now develop regarding councils that do not spend their allocation for Traveller accommodation on an annual basis and refuse to deal with the issue. The Minister, who sanctions funding for other pet projects, must make it hurt if that local authority is not prepared to address Traveller accommodation. Most councils are responsible and want to deal with this issue, but there are some, to which Members have alluded, which do not want to address it and have a bigoted attitude to the Travelling community. That must stop.