"Flawed" - London Traveller charity condemns Mayor’s new plans for Traveller pitches

The Mayor of London’s new plan for more Traveller pitches has been condemned by the charity London Gypsies and Travellers (LGT), who say that there are “errors” in it which have led to a big undercount of the number of new Traveller pitches that are needed in the capital city.

Researchers from LGT point out that a previous 2008 Greater London Authority plan for new Traveller pitches in London established a need for 1,626 pitches in London and that the highest figure proposed by the 2025 pitch plan, which is currently in its draft form, has been reduced to about half that.

Instead, because of population growth since 2008, the number of Traveller pitches needed should have gone up – not down, says Philomena Mongan, the Community Engagement Officer at LGT 

“There is a need for 2000 pitches in London, and they are saying there's only a need for 851 pitches for the whole of London,” says Philomena Mongan.

“This is so wrong, the final report we read is full of mistakes. City Hall has a chance to put things right. Our people's needs have to be met. And we need to be heard. So, we are calling on London's government to do the right thing: get their numbers right."

A pitch is a space for one mobile home or trailer, a touring caravan and a day room for washing and cooking – typically a single-family unit. All planning authorities or regional planning authorities – like the Greater London Authority - have to plan for housing need and population growth – including for minorities like Gypsies and Travellers whose way of life includes living in caravans on Traveller sites.

Although many Gypsies and Travellers live in bricks and mortar housing, that can be either through choice or necessity – because there are so few socially rented Traveller sites. The last socially rented site in London was built in 1996 in Haringey.

Since then, according to LGT researchers, at least London two sites were closed to make way for developments: Bounds Green in Haringey in 2004, Thurston Road in Lewisham in 2009, and  Springtide Close in Southwark has been closed and hoarded for Council storage use since 2020.   

The new 2025 plan is still in its draft form and came as a shock to the four community organisations -  London Gypsies and Travellers, Peabody Traveller and Equine Liaison, Roma Support Group and Southwark Travellers Action Group – who helped with the initial research for the Greater London Authority.

All four organisations have demanded that their names are removed from the 2025 pitch plan unless their concerns are addressed.

Among the failures of the 2025 pitch plan, LGT say, are:

• The researchers’ methodology for calculating cultural preference for living on a pitch rather than in bricks and mortar has not been agreed with community experts and has resulted in an inaccurate reduction of pitch need.
• Much of the assessment report and conclusions do not reflect the Roma context or key findings – failing to address overcrowding, which is one of most significant housing issues experienced by Roma.
• The reliance on census data for Gypsy, Roma and Traveller populations of London is highly controversial because they are known to be undercounts.”

“Despite raising our serious concerns with the GLA about the undercount of the actual need for pitches – which is the result of poor research methods – the GLA has concluded that the report is ‘robust’ and going through the approval process,” said Nancy Hawker, LGT’s Policy and Research Officer.

“We are still hopeful that the London-wide Gypsy and Traveller Accommodation Needs Assessment will be corrected, so as to provide an accurate and fair evidence base for building the affordable housing we need – as the Mayor committed to do.”

 However, the Greater London Authority appears to be sticking to its guns – and its “flawed methodology” -  for the time being.

 “As the most robust source available to calculate the Gypsy and Traveller population living in bricks and mortar homes, the Gypsy and Traveller Accommodation Needs Assessment (GTANA or Traveller pitch plan) uses the census, alongside household surveys to determine their accommodation needs,” a spokesperson for the Greater London Authority told the Travellers Times.

“For those living on pitches, the GTANA uses comprehensive household surveys conducted on sites,” said the spokesperson adding that their research was “robust,” adding that the need for for pitches was not the same as a demand for accommodation.

"Community experts on the London GTANA 2025 "steering group" are simply asking for the research to be correct,” said LGT’s Nancy Hawker.

“Definitions of need in relation to suitability and overcrowding are not new concepts in planning: the methods that come with these terms should have been embedded in the research.”

“The research that the GLA commissioned still contains numbers that are known to be wrong, and methods on which none of the experts signed off.”

“The quality is so poor that if the GLA goes ahead and uses this version of  the London GTANA 2025 as evidence for planning London, then our four groups ( London Gypsies and Travellers, Peabody Traveller and Equine Liaison, Roma Support Group and Southwark Travellers Action Group ) have asked the deputy mayor of London to remove our names from the report, even though we contributed significantly to the production of the research from the beginning, in 2022.

“Nevertheless, we are hopeful that the GLA will be true to its promises of engagement and inclusion, and not only do a correct assessment, but also set targets to deliver social rented housing, of which council-run pitches are a part.

Because of the shortage, some of the most disadvantaged and excluded ethnic minorities in the UK are enduring homelessness, overcrowding, discrimination, and manifold negative social outcomes. We are calling on the GLA to do the following:

• Correct the population figures: the Census numbers are undercounts;
• Use human-rights-based methodology for calculating the need for living in a caravan on a communal site;
• Include Roma housing needs in the "conclusions" and "key findings" sections of the report;
• Address the situation of overcrowding in Roma households as evidence of need;
• Provide the "steering group" organizations with the complete aggregated results of the fieldwork and surveys, as promised (seeing as the collection of the findings was facilitated or undertaken by our organizations). 

Without sites, the Travelling culture withers. London loses diversity." said Nancy Hawker, Policy  and Research Officer for London Gypsies and Travellers.  

TT News

(Photograph. London Gypsy and Traveller activists join a London march for housing in 2016. Photography by Natasha Quarmby/Fields of Light)