Robert Ashton is supporting a Romany planning application for four more mobile homes on local land. He feels very alone.
You know doing nothing is never really an option. The people who cross the street rather than help someone in distress must accept some responsibility for what happens as a consequence of their neglect. To witness and ignore is to condone the wrong you may have accidentally exposed.
I'm not encouraging you to intervene in a drunken street brawl, or give chase to an armed bank robber. That would be to risk your own safety; but what about prejudice, racism and discrimination? Do you speak out, or do you remain one of the silent majority?
I had to confront this dilemma myself the other day. A Romany guy living nearby has applied for planning consent for four additional mobile homes on a piece of land he owns. It's not within the development envelope of the nearby village but he already has consent for two caravans; his own and one occupied by his widowed sister.
His situation is not unusual. He keeps animals and smallholders often get temporary consent for a mobile home. The difference here is that the smallholder is Romany.
The motivation for the application was to enable his four sons, their wives and children to join him and settle down. The family want the youngsters to have proper schooling. The nomadic life disrupts schooling, denying youngsters the qualifications they need to make their own way in the world.
It all sounds very laudable. But read the letters of opposition penned by my neighbours and you read a catalogue of fear. Rather than take the trouble to check the facts, many have chosen to write what verges on racist vitriol. In fact the letter that dropped through my letterbox, urging me to object, was inaccurate and frankly offensive.
Yesterday I had a call from the agent. It seems I’m the first person he’s encountered in 30 years to write a letter in support of a Romany planning application. Why? Am I mad, or is this attitude of blanket objection the thin end of a potentially very nasty racist wedge?
