Moving Forward: The Provision of Accommodation for Gypsies and Travellers

This report sets out the issues relating to the provision of accommodation for Travellers and Gypsies including what has gone before, and the consequences of the existing approach for the Travelling community, for local authorities, and for those parts of the settled community affected by unauthorised encampments. It sets out a framework for addressing current and projected need based on the provision of public sites through mainstreamed housing provision and improved planning procedures to facilitate the appropriate development of private sites by Travellers and Gypsies. It suggests that the solutions to addressing the current inadequacies of accommodation (both quantity and quality) lie in: ensuring that the existing obligations to ensure equality of access to public provision and promote good race relations are properly utilised as a lever for change; in reforms of government planning and housing strategies which can provide a vehicle to ensure that Traveller and Gypsy accommodation needs are properly resourced and enforced; and in the on-going ODPM review of its own Travellers and Gypsies Strategy.