A call has been made for Taoiseach Enda Kenny to intervene directly in the plight of the Traveller community in the wake of the deaths of 10 people in the Carrickmines, Co Dublin, fire.
As the funerals of five of the victims took place in Bray, Co Wicklow, yesterday, Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams called on Mr Kenny to show leadership in the stand-off with residents in Rockville Drive, the proposed location of a temporary halting site for members of the community left homeless by the fire.
And he called on the Taoiseach to establish an all-island forum to fundamentally review the treatment of Travellers in Irish society.
Mr Adams said that on other issues in the past the Taoiseach had shown leadership. “You stood up and said that this is what we needed to do,” he told Mr Kenny. “Our society can be defined by the treatment of these citizens.”
Mr Kenny said the national flag was flying at half mast on all public buildings today as a mark of sympathy and solidarity with the families who had lost their loved ones.
The Taoiseach did not believe a new forum was the appropriate approach to take. “I am not sure that having another separate administrative operation is the way to go here.”
Ministerial forum
He suggested that the North-South ministerial forum could feed into the Traveller accommodation issue and said it could be an item on the agenda of the next meeting to see how they could proceed. There was a role for the housing approval body Cena and Traveller accommodation groups, he added.
Mr Adams said Travellers “are treated in a shameful way. Babies on the side of the road, no toilet facilities, no water, no beds, no prospects and no hope.”
He said “some good can come out of these 10 dreadful deaths but only if the Government acts”.
Mr Kenny told him: “It will not bring back any of those who lost their lives, obviously.”
The Taoiseach said the carrying out of a national audit of Traveller accommodation would bring its own revelations.
He said it was a question of making decisions that would allow for appropriate accommodation and the provision of all necessary facilities.
