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Travellers plan events to change attitudes

June 12, 2009

IN 1954 the Encyclopaedia Britannica entry on ‘Gipsy’ stated: “The mental age of the average adult gipsy is thought to be about that of a child of 10.”

It also said they had “never accomplished anything of great significance in writing, painting, musical composition, science or social organisation” and they were “quarrelsome, quick to anger or laughter… unthinkingly but not deliberately cruel”.

Now, some 55 years later, Encyclopaedia Britannica has changed its mind, but the local travellers community, many of whom live in Ash, worry others have not.

Organisers of the Gypsy, Roma and Traveller History Month – a series of events around the country aimed at educating people about the minority group – said it was needed because Britain’s 300,000 travellers “continue to suffer extreme levels of prejudice and discrimination”.

Abuse

Nine out of 10 children and young people from gypsy backgrounds have suffered racist abuse, according to surveys.

They are also the worst-performing ethnic minority in schools in Britain.

Two actvities during the month of awareness events are taking place in the Surrey and Hampshire area.

There will be a poster drawing competition in Ash and a Travellers’ Got Talent event in Hartley Wintney, where travellers from Surrey and Hampshire will compete with traditional Romany music and dance.

Surrey has the fourth largest travelling community in the country, at 10,000 people.

Harmony

Local authorities in Britain count the number of traveller caravans in their areas but not the number of travellers.

Ann Wilson is the organiser for the South East nationwide programme of events and traveller community development officer for voluntary group, Surrey Community Action.

She explained that the impetus for the event was the decision made last year to include Romany travellers as an ethnicity in the 2011 national census.

The first annual history month was held last year.

Mrs Wilson said: “Finally, they have recognised us. We’ve only been in England 500 years.”

She hoped the history month would change attitudes about travellers, which she did not think had changed a great deal.

She said: “When I was at school I would get a lot of verbal abuse.

“They would call us pikeys. I didn't know what that word meant or what it had to do with us. I still don't.”

Mrs Wilson’s parents lived a nomadic existence with their families when they were born and her father was born in the back of a wagon.

Settled

Neither had gone very far in school, her mother taught herself to read and write but her father could not master the skills.

By the time Mrs Wilson, 49, was born, her parents had built a house for themselves in Effingham.

Compared to her parents, she lived a relatively settled life and, unlike them, she went to secondary school – something she said was rare at the time for Romanies.

She later moved to Salvation Place, a community of travellers in Leatherhead which has one of only three traveller churches in the South East.

There her literacy meant she was often called on to help friends who struggled with letters and tax returns.

Her children also attended school but, like her, they found they had problems being accepted.

Mrs Wilson said her daughter, now 26, struggled at secondary school and that her head teacher said it was because she was a "low intelligence gypsy girl".

Mrs Wilson removed her daughter and, with the help of the newly-established Surrey Travellers’ Forum, found a special needs school for her.

Her 14-year-old son, a keen gypsy jazz enthusiast, is planning to compete in the Travellers’ Got Talent contest and he also hopes to play at a gypsy jazz festival in France later this month.

Mrs Wilson said: “With the contest, it’s Hampshire travellers against Surrey travellers.

“People who want to perform can perform anything but we’re expecting it to be a lot of gypsy dance and music.”

Auditions for Travellers’ Got Talent take place on Friday and June 19, between 4pm and 8pm at the Victoria Hall in West Green Road, Hartley Wintney.

Other events during Gypsy, Roma and Traveller History Month include a history day, featuring wagons, horses, music and paintings, to be held in Bourne Hall, Ewell, on Saturday, June 20.

There will also be a competition to design posters about traveller culture, which takes place at Primrose Hall, in Ash Hill Road, Ash, on Sunday, June 21.

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