No planning permission for the site to be there. Despite this, and knowing this through official documentation from the local council clearly highlighting what the long term repercussions would be, sections of the Dale Farm community chose to build semi permanent residences on this land. I can't build a house in my garden without the relevant permissions either. It's a perfectly level and non discriminatory level playing field. Why travellers would wish to build "permanent" residences anyway is surely a contradiction in terms.

There are also a number of perfectly good, and legal, travellers settlements nearby in South Ockenden, Aveley and Grays. You can see why permission would be refused.

They UN and EU comparing this to Jewish settlements on the West Bank and the Chinese ethnic cleansing is, frankly, bonkers.

OOAA.

If I was to build another house in our garden without planning permission, the local council would be round like a shot. Why should the residential travellers of Dale Farm be treated any differently? And no, I don't read the Daily Mail.

find my iew PC or not but we have fields in front of our house that are owned by a farmer. If Gypsies suddenly turned up there and were left to leave their detritus everywhere and cause a nuisance to their neighbours without any challenge from the authorities then I would most likely take the law into my own hands. I agree with one of the above comments - they do not bring anything of value to society and bugger human rights. What about the human rights of law abiding citizens who have invested in and take pride in their property. The biggest worry for me is they have been able to get away with it for so long.

.....an anti-Iraq War march, an exporting on lorries of live animals abroad issue, as I don't think public opinion is against the police and local council on this one.

49 out of 54 buildings without planning permission is a pretty damning statistic.

Oh, and I'd take being stuck in a lift with one of the residents long before being stuck in a lift with one of the activists.

it was the activists causing all the aggro with the police whilst the travellers were caught in the crossfire. Yt this was only gonna end one way once the "protestors" arrived, wasn't it?

Its strange that the law has defended the travellers of Dale Farm up to now and all the judges are lovely. Today, the law is an ass when it acts against them.

There is blame on all sides - the council for letting it drag out, the travellers for not accepting alternatives and the media for in turn painting them as criminals or whiter than white.

As with all these things its not that simple. I suspect our European cousins are looking at the police conduct and saying "why aren't they using water cannon to blast those buggers off the scaffolding?"

...I have absolutely no problem with people living however they want. I really dislike all the horrible things said about "pikeys" and "gyppoes" and so on, because, to me, it's flat out disgusting and - depending on your view of what constitutes a race - pretty much racist.

On Dale Farm, specifically, I'm a little confused. Sure, they broke planning permission. But why does that give the council the right to remove them from land for which they legitimately paid? I guess I'm missing something. Knock the structures down, sure, but chuck them off the land? Don't see how that follows. Someone will enlighten me, I'm sure.

However, I think that however you want to live, you have to live considerately, and you have to pay into any societal setups from which you plan to derive a benefit (benefit in the large sense, not in the sense of 'on benefit').

As long as travellers do that, I have zero problem. None whatsoever. But if anyone, regardless of their heritage, wants something from the state, they need to accept that it doesn't come for free. If they don't want to pay for it, they can't expect its benefits or protection. And littering/squatting and so on is just antisocial and wrong.

It's a real shame that some traveller communities do behave very badly. I'm sure there are tons, a majority, that don't impinge negatively on anyone else at all. But like anything, a few bad apples don't half sour the reputation of the whole.

a radio report (on BBC 5 Live) stating that protestors had banners with "no ethnic cleansing here", I lose any sympathy. A lack of perspective is the least of it, this is just chronic ignorance and stupidity.

Why do these bloody "activists" have to turn up everywhere where they think they're going to have a go at knocking a copper's hat off !
I've got no sympathy with the Dale farm residents - they are there illegally, they knew what was going to happen and they obviously wanted confrontation with the forces of law and order.
Let's face it - however much sympathy anyone can feel for these people would dissipate in a second if they came and parked their vehicles next to your property and left the sort of unsanitary, disgusting mess that they leave everywhere

My wife's godfather (also a teacher) asked me if I could 'send them all back to Ireland.' He really seemed to despise them all. That a professed Christian, and a well-educated professional could hold these views really shocked me.

Apart from teaching "these People" a lesson, how are the council actions improving the situation for everyone? I would think its highly likely that at least some of the travellers are now going to role up in a less suitable site and Dale Farm will be left for what?

here's one from you:

"It's a real shame that some traveller communities do behave very badly. I'm sure there are tons, a majority, that don't impinge negatively on anyone else at all. But like anything, a few bad apples don't half sour the reputation of the whole"

Wow. Just replace "traveller communities" with "black people" and see how it sounds

yeah the council are right bastards

One of the travellers on the site, the only one that Radio 5 seemed to talk to over the last couple of months, said that 60 members of her immediate family are on the Dale Farm site. I'm guessing that they all wanted to move into the same site if they were relocated and that wasn't possible.

Thou of course they now claim they have never been offered an alternative by the council ever in the last decade.

my understanding is that once a council allows development on green belt land it's a slippery slope and before you know it, the whole lot will be concreted over. It just suits the Dale Farm people to play the oppressed minority card.
As usual, OOAA

I was amused to find that I am now characterised as "part of the settled community".

Somehow or the other, I have ended up with a reputation as a dentist who will happily treat members of the travelling communities.

I treat all people as they come. I respect them and, I hope, they respect me. The Travellers I treat tend to be rough and ready people. Mostly illiterate, heavy drinkers, heavy smokers and with little respect for normal healthcare regimes, it is no surprise that they die young. They appreciate immediate treatment and, despite reputations, they always pay promptly.

Always in cash.

They tend to be rowdy. They tend to turn up en masse. I normally book Travellers in at times when none of my more regular patients will be around.

Portsmouth sees less of them now. A few years back, a group of caravans camped on Canoe Lake Park in Southsea. The posh bit. Where the more.. Erm.. Colourful members of Portsmouth's.. Erm.. Business community tend to live. The Travellers were asked to leave by representatives of said community. They didn't.

There was rumoured to have been a fairly substantial dust-up which involved fatalities on the side of the Travellers. Plod were, apparently, looking the other way that night.

As I say. All rumours.

As far as I am aware, no Travellers have set up camp on the Island since.

My practice is outside Portsea Island.

It does make me laugh, in a twisted cynical way, that they're booting people out of places they've lived in for years, permissions or no while our government is planning to revise planning and building permissions to allow big business to build on green belt land.

http://www.constructionenquirer.com/2011/10/06/cameron-promises-tory-hou...

Sheev and Bob and all the other liberal nice guys above are to be admired for their, well, liberality. Hell, I'm one too. And Dale Farm is a sobering tale, sad for the kids, shows Basildon in a bad light, and has the right-of-centre scurrying with outrage.

We Irish have various more or less bile-filled words for the travellers/gypsies/tinkers/itinerants. Their lifestyle is indeed ancient but they are not nearly as prevalent as they used to be, many having settled down in provided housing. The country went through this hand-wringing mud-slinging soul-searching debate years ago.

Growing up in the 60s and 70s, I remember the gypsy camps on the outskirts of every town. They were never welcome anywhere, being regarded variously as shifty, rowdy, dishonest, feuding, and criminal.
Maybe this was stereotyping of an oppressed minority: I personally never had any unpleasant encounters. Undoubtedly though, when they moved on, they would leave a mess behind them, not just some litter but literally truckloads of crap draped across the hedges and bushes of our green and pleasant land.

So, as their mentality seems to be to suck the life out of wherever they happen to be, and despite being an easy-going right-on liberal type of person, it's difficult for me to feel any sympathy for them.

so it might as well be me...

(Full size image at http://pigeonsnest.co.uk/stuff/thieving-gypsy-bastards.html)