6. Statement by the Leader of the House: Enabling Gypsies, Roma and Travellers

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 4:52 pm on 26 June 2018.

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Photo of Jenny Rathbone Jenny Rathbone Labour 4:52, 26 June 2018

Thank you, leader of the house, for your statement. I think it's very heartening to hear that we've got cross-party support for this plan, because I think that's incredibly important. As you say, this is a real litmus test of whether or not we're a civilised society. You also point out that discrimination against these communities is considered to be the last acceptable form of racism, and clearly we need to tackle that.

I'm interested that you are encouraging people to report any discrimination that they're suffering to the police. I was a little bit disturbed to read about a survey done by the Traveller movement recently, with various police forces, about the attitudes amongst some police forces and the lack of due regard for their public sector equality duties in relation to the Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities. This survey and other issues that have been uncovered are going to be presented to the National Police Chiefs Council this Friday. I've no idea whether any of the Welsh police forces have been involved, but clearly, were there to be any causes for concern, we would need to pick that up. I think it's particularly important at this time, when Gypsy, Roma and Travellers are being harassed across Europe, particularly, unfortunately, in Italy most recently, where there are even attempts at ethnic cleansing, which is very disturbing.

I just want to now turn to the important points you're making about ensuring that Gypsies, Travellers and Roma are doing well in education, because I do recall that the achievement amongst Gypsies and Travellers is notably worse than for any other ethnic minority group. I just want to highlight the excellent work being done at Cathays High School, which is actually in Julie Morgan's constituency, but it's on the edge of mine, and many of them actually live in Cardiff Central. Patrik Bandy is a Czech Roma, who joined Cathays High School in year 8. He achieved A and A* in art and design and textiles at GCSE. He then went on to take three A-levels, and then he had numerous universities that wanted to give him a place because of the excellence of his work. He's just completed his first year at Cardiff Metropolitan University, and he's already put on fashion shows, and he's clearly going to be somebody we're going to hear about in the future. 

Secondly, Cynthia Kandurova is a Czech Roma who is currently excelling at A-level English as well as health and social care, and she's hoping to read English literature at university in the future. I think this reflects the really great work being done by teachers at Cathays High School, backed up by the minority ethnic grant. So, I wondered what conversations you've had with the Cabinet Secretary for Education about the continuance of the minority ethnic achievement grant, because I think it's really, really important—particularly if we've got pupils coming in in-year, we do need to input extra support for them to ensure they settle down in their education. 

I just want to ask if there are any local authorities that are resisting establishing new sites for the Gypsy and Roma Traveller community, because I remember having conversations with Carl Sargeant about this when we were passing the relevant legislation, and he was absolutely adamant that we needed to ensure that there were sites in every local authority, not just the good ones—in every local authority.