| Description | Charles Parker interviews Bryan Long, welfare officer at Hampshire County Council, about the integration of the travelling community into settled society.
Track 1: Bryan Long talks about the need to re-house members of the travelling community in the area they have been living, so that they can stay in their jobs and their children can continue to attend the same schools, and so that they can feel comfortable in a familiar environment, close to their friends. He emphasises the importance to intersperse their housing with local residents from the settled community. He thinks that it will take several years to eradicate the travellers way of life, and talks about the training programmes the council can offer 2.39 mins
Track 2: he talks about some of the health problems suffered by travellers and the difficulties in trying to treat health conditions in the situation the community lives in. He discusses the difficulties in starting initiatives for travellers because of institutional prejudices, the media interest in the travelling community and the long delays in getting anything done for them. He talks about the difficulties in selecting a permanent site for travellers to camp 2.34 mins
Track 3: Bryan Long continues to talk about the obstacles to establishing a permanent site for travellers that will satisfy the various council departments, the land owners, the settled community, and the travellers themselves. He discusses his concerns that the travellers will lose confidence in him and the other council social workers, and the need to open a site in Hampshire soon. He describes a recent visit to Thornyhill compound where a family who had been re-housed were telling the other travellers about the things they liked about their new home. He thinks the way forward is for these families to act as advocates for the scheme 3.14 mins
Track 4: he explains the reasons for some of the delays in acquiring land for travellers, disputes with the Forestry Commission concerning land in the New Forest to build a rehabilitation centre, and negotiations with local residents 2.50 mins
Track 5: he discusses the negative reaction of local residents to the proposals for building rehabilitation centres and re-housing travellers and the definition of 'non-nomadic' travellers as 'gypsies', and makes comparisons with welfare work carried out in Europe with the travelling community 2.40 mins
Track 6: Caroline Hughes sings s song beginning 'As I was a strolling down through the dark arches'
Total: 18.29 mins
Dubber's reference number: PLA DH444B0778174 |