Knock locals refuse to assist in finding suitable location for transient halting site
Áine Ryan
A MAJOR INITIATIVE to resolve issues arising from large groups of Travellers arriving in the county for the annual Croagh Patrick pilgrimage and the Knock Novena has failed.
The Mayo News understands that, despite the endeavours of a group of interested parties to identify a temporary halting site in the Knock area for the duration of the religious festivals – which between them attract up to 200,000 people – no location was identified or offered.
Supt Pádraic O’Toole – who spearheaded the project after tensions between locals and Travellers led to a blockade of Knock’s streets last year – confirmed yesterday (Monday) that ‘no agreement has been reached to date regarding issues that arose last year’.
“We put a policing plan in place each year for the novena and review and amend it as is necessary. That process will be addressed in the next few weeks,” said Supt O’Toole, who declined to comment further on the failure of the group to identify a suitable site.
However, Mayo County Council’s Traveller Liaison Officer, Mr Gary Smith, told The Mayo News yesterday that ‘despite the tireless efforts’ of the group, it was advised categorically by locals that there would be ‘no site’ made available.
“We brought all the parties together. And residents in the area took a stance, the community basically said ‘no’. We can’t force the situation,” said Mr Smith.
The group included Council Director of Services, Mr Peter Hynes, Mayo Traveller Support Group’s (MTSG) Ms Mona Munywika, members of the Knock Area Development Association (KADA) and residents from Kiltimagh.
However, Mr John Rattigan, the Chairman of KADA said last night that the real problem was the Traveller vans blocking the streets, footpaths, shops and guesthouses.
“There is no problem if they parked outside the village. There’s a caravan park in Knock and some of them parked there last year. There’s also the car parks where they can park,” said Mr Rattigan.
Last year tensions reached a climax after about 30 vans and caravans blocked houses and retail premises during the novena. After a number of days, residents set up a blockade on the village’s Main Street and forced the Travellers to leave.
At the time, a local garage-owner, Mr Kieran Whelton, told The Mayo News that the blockade was not ’anti-Traveller’ and was held simply to highlight the fact that the community did not want their streets blocked. He also said it was the first year that Travellers had parked on the Main Street, apparently because they had been prohibited from parking elsewhere.
“We felt intimidated and we could not access our properties and go about our business at the height of the tourist season. They tied their dogs to our fencing, which is naturally annoying. This protest was a call to the Gardaí and Mayo County Council to resolve the issue,” said Mr Whelton. He also observed that gardaí were not provided with the proper resources to deal with the issues.
Ms Mona Munywika, Co-Ordinator of MTSG said yesterday that she is set to attend a Council meeting today (Tuesday) at which the issue will be discussed.
“We did have some meetings but there was a certain resistance from the local communities. The Council was prepared to proceed but it could not get local residents to compromise. I don’t know whether the situation will be managed to be resolved for this year,” said Ms Munywika.
An eight-year commitment to develop two transient halting sites is ‘low-priority’ in the Mayo County Council’s Traveller Accommodation Programmme, which has prioritised accommodation for the county’s indigenous population.
In accordance with the provisions of the Housing Traveller Accommodation Act (1998), local authorities are statutorily obliged to adopt five-year-plans for providing suitable accommodation for travellers.
