Bridging gap with Traveller community

Bridge-building - it's a phrase we hear often on this island though rarely, if ever, in relation to our own indigenous ethnic minority - the Travelling community.

The Citizen Traveller campaign is an attempt to address this and to redress the "misconceptions" held by the settled community of the 22,000 Travellers living in the State.

Too often the pictures that come to mind when the word Traveller is uttered are of untidy, scrap-strewn halting sites, large numbers of children in each family, the adults drinking too much and too openly, and violence. We assume a disinclination on their part to integrate.

This may be the image, and the Traveller community would not deny that there is some truth to it, but beyond that there has been little examination of why that should be the image.

Why are their [unofficial] sites often unsightly? An absence of rubbish collecting, running water or electricity, the placing of sites on poor-quality land which gets muddy after one rainfall may be reasons. Or perhaps Travellers just are dirty.

Why are they associated with too much and too open drinking? The fact they are frequently barred from pubs and are forced to drink outdoors may be a reason. Or perhaps a large number of Travellers just are alcoholic.

Why haven't they integrated? An historical exclusion born of their Travelling lifestyle, exacerbated by political and social discrimination may be reasons, as well as an expectation that simply "giving up" their Traveller culture would solve their, and everyone else's, problems with Traveller life. Or perhaps "they" just aren't "fit" for mainstream society.

In short, "we" tend to see "them" as a problem of their own making. We rarely ask what "they" think of "us" or how both settled and Traveller contribute to the negative images "we" have of "them".

Even the language implies a psychological apartheid.

The Citizen Traveller campaign is intended to create a better understanding between the communities.

Conceived two years ago, it grew out of the 1995 Report of the Task Force on the Travelling Community and was launched with radio ads last October. From today outdoor advertising will feature in the campaign.

Having been allocated £900,000 by the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform, it will run over three years. Its target audiences are not only individuals in the communities, but key opinion leaders such as politicians, the judiciary, gardai and the media.

According to its spokeswoman, Ms Jacinta Brack, Citizen Traveller is the first campaign of its kind in Europe and "is being watched closely".

Similar public education campaigns based on human rights issues have been successful, she says, in Australia, where the Aboriginal population was the focus.

"As well as promoting a better understanding of Travellers the campaign aims to encourage Travellers to take pride in their own cultural identity."

Four Travellers' organisations are involved in the Citizen Traveller, the National Traveller Women's Forum, the Irish Traveller Movement, Pavee Point and the Parish of Travelling People.

Today, and for the rest of this week in The Irish Times, Travellers will describe their lives - through interviews and also in their own words - and describe how they see themselves, as citizens of Ireland.