In November last year, Priti Patel proposed new legislation which will target the gypsy community.

Today am I announcing the Government’s plans to consult on criminalising the act of trespassing when setting up an unauthorised encampment in England and Wales. I recognise the distress and misery that some unauthorised encampments cause to many communities and businesses across the country. Currently, this kind of trespass is a civil matter and the powers available to the police are limited.

The legislation suggests that the police should be able to immediately confiscate the vehicles of “anyone whom they suspect to be trespassing on land with the purpose of residing on it”.

The Guardian reported:

Patel’s proposed laws belong to the most dangerous of all political categories: performative oppression. She is beating up a marginalised group in full public view, to show that she sides with the majority. I don’t know whether she really intends to introduce these laws, or whether this is empty electioneering. In either case, she is playing with fire. Already this month, three caravans in Somerset have allegedly been torched by suspected arsonists. Travelling peoples have been attacked like this for centuries, and sometimes murdered. In 2003, a 15-year-old Traveller child, Johnny Delaney, was kicked to death by a gang of teenagers in Ellesmere Port, Cheshire.

The consultation acknowledges that there is nowhere else for these communities to go, other than the council house waiting list, which means abandoning the key elements of their culture. During the Conservative purge in the late 1980s and early 1990s, two thirds of traditional, informal stopping sites for travellers, some of which had been in use for thousands of years, were sealed off. Then, in 1994, the Criminal Justice Act repealed the duty of local authorities to provide official sites for Roma and Travellers.

If this legislation goes ahead it will most likely result in an increase in hate crime towards gypsies. Those committing hate crimes will feel they can justify their crimes as they will believe the government is supporting them through the legislation. A lot of people will lose their homes and culture as well as state protection meaning they won’t be able to report hate crimes. This could result in a very dangerous case of persecution. The consultation is currently open and you can contribute here. It closes on 4th March 2020.