Power, C. (2003) Irish Travellers: Ethnicity, Racism and pre-Sentence Reports (PJ) more

Probation Journal The Journal of Community and Criminal Justice Copyright © 2003 NAPO Vol 50(3): 252–266 [0264-5505(200309)50:3;252–266;037157] www.napo.org.uk www.sagepublications.com Article Irish Travellers: Ethnicity, racism and pre-sentence reports Colm Power, St. Mary’s College, Strawberry Hill Abstract This article examines the treatment of Irish Travellers in the criminal justice system. It provides a brief background to Irish Traveller ethnicity and then outlines the causes, extent and consequences of social marginalization, ethnic disqualification and criminalization in Britain’s Irish Traveller population. This leads to a discussion of criminal justice concerns through the examination of existing research on pre-sentence reports (PSRs) concerning Irish Travellers, and interviews with probation officers and others which helped to explore overt and embedded prejudice and racism in the language and construction of PSRs. The article finishes by assessing possible ways to ameliorate these injustices in the sentencing process. Keywords criminal justice, criminalization, ethnicity, Irish, Manchester, nomadism, pre-sentence reports, probation, PSRs, Traveller Introduction This article outlines in brief ‘who’ Irish Travellers are, and highlights some aspects of the racism and discrimination faced by this community in contemporary Britain. It then examines some very specific issues related to overt and institutional discriminatory practices experienced by Irish Travellers in the compilation of probation presentence reports (PSRs) and consequent sentencing outcomes. The article uses primary and secondary sources from the Greater Manchester Probation Area (GMPA) and elsewhere to highlight racism against Irish Travellers in PSRs, and also reviews initiatives coming from GMPA and elsewhere that challenge these injustices. This article is based on primary qualitative research conducted as part of ‘Room to Roam: Britain’s Irish Travellers’, a Community Fund resourced research project run by a consortium that includes Action Group for Irish Youth, BIAS Irish Travellers Project, and St. Mary’s College, Strawberry Hill. This three-year project, conducted between March 2000 and June 2003, involved focus groups and 140 in-depth Power ● Irish Travellers: Ethnicity, racism and pre-sentence reports 253 interviews with Irish Travellers and relevant service providers (health, education, social services, politicians, voluntary services, police and criminal justice system) in London and Manchester. The criminal justice element of the research project was enhanced after the project began as a result of growing anecdotal evidence (e.g. from voluntary outreach workers in the prison system) suggesting that the relatively high numbers of Irish Travellers in the prison system were being discriminated against. Much of this evidence came from Irish foreign nationals groups operating in two London prisons. A small number of key criminal justice professionals (police, probation officers, prison officers and voluntary workers) and 20 prisoners were interviewed in this particular research area. The research aimed to assess the impact of social marginalization, ethnic disqualification, and criminalization on Travellers’ health and life-chances and to suggest positive policy and practice developments. The primary data in this paper draws on a number of interviews with criminal justice professionals and offenders, but there is a particular focus on in-depth interviews conducted in 2002 with two female probation officers working in Manchester. These probation officers had worked extensively with Irish Travellers, including running a discussion group for Irish Traveller women. The quotes used from their interviews serve to link Devereaux’s (1999) analysis of discriminatory language in PSRs on Irish people to salient aspects of Irish Traveller culture, ethnicity and experience. The ‘Room to Roam’ research project itself does not attempt a comprehensive analysis of PSRs on Irish Travellers, and this article uses interview evidence to support the general thesis of the research concerning the marginalization and criminalization of Irish Travellers in Britain. This paper links academic critiques of ethnocentrism and racism in PSRs with the discriminatory treatment of Irish people in PSRs and locates much of the resultant racism in sedentary prejudices against nomadism and Irish Travellers in particular. Who are Irish Travellers? Irish Travellers are an indigenous nomadic minority group principally located in Ireland, Britain and the USA. They have been part of British society for centuries according to historical sources (Adams et al., 1975, pp. 172–173). Irish Travellers’ distinctive way of life, values, culture and traditions manifest themselves most clearly in Traveller ‘nomadism’, the centrality of the extended family, their own language, a ‘traditional’ Catholic spirituality, and the entrepreneurial and predominantly self-employed nature of their economies. Many Irish Travellers still speak the language known as ‘Gammon’ or ‘Cant’ – a combination of ‘disguised’ Irish and English words employing English language syntax. Irish Travellers use the language within their own community and sometimes in the presence of settled people, for instance in confrontational situations. Irish Travellers have also played a significant role in propagating aspects of Irish cultural expression like music and storytelling (McCann et al., 1994, pp. xi–xxvi). They are a distinct ethnic group recognized by the Race Relations Act 1976 and the Race Relations Amendment Act 2001. 254 Probation Journal 50(3) Historically, Irish Travellers were employed in horse trading, seasonal farmwork, rural crafts, selling domestic goods door-to-door (hawking), busking, and as tinsmiths and tradesmen. They filled vital niches in the economy of pre-industrialized Ireland and parts of rural Britain up to the 1950s. Many Irish Traveller extended families had established regular annual migratory patterns that included traveling between Ireland and various parts of Britain. Urbanization, mass production of cheap disposable plastics, and the mechanisation of agriculture undermined the traditional basis of the Traveller economy. They migrated in large numbers to major cities in Britain for employment opportunities from the late 1950s onwards. A combination of social exclusivity, nomadism, cohesive extended families, and a strong resistance to wage-labour underpinned the nature and structure of the Irish Traveller economy. Travellers’ entrepreneurial skills adapted as the ‘mainstream’ economy changed post 1945. Access to motor vehicles gave rise to new opportunities for commercial nomadism, but also brought Travellers into contact with state regulatory agencies. As a consequence of modernization the Irish Traveller economy has shifted to casual building work, tarmacing, market stalls, gardening and scrap metal collection. Some have developed successful businesses dealing in antiques and furnishings (Traveller interviews, Power forthcoming, 2003; Adams et al., 1975, pp. 172–187). Demographics Accurate statistics on Irish Travellers are difficult to obtain as they are not yet specifically defined as a separate ethnic grouping on census forms. Current Traveller population estimates by the Department of Environment, Transport and the Regions (DETR) are based on local counts of trailers on official sites, or other ‘known’ unauthorized encampments, carried out by local authorities. The ‘total population’ is extrapolated from the ‘estimated’ occupancy per trailer. This reporting procedure is non-mandatory and incomplete – no information is collected on specific Traveller population numbers, age, gender, or ethnicity – so no accurate government statistics exist for Irish Travellers in Britain (Hickman and Walter, 1997, pp. 20–21). Recent government figures for England (ODPM, 2001) indicate that 13,802 trailers were counted by local authorities overall.1 Of those, 3,346 were in unauthorized camps, indicating that just over 24 percent of all ‘counted’ Travellers have no legal stopping places and are constantly under threat of eviction with no secure place to reside. The above estimates do not include the large numbers of Irish Travellers who are living either temporarily or permanently in settled forms of accommodation (Power, forthcoming 2003). Many ‘settled’ Irish Travellers have been forced from their traditional nomadic way of life due to lack of trailer sites and the virtual outlawing of nomadism in England and Wales by the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act (CJPOA 1994). No official data are collected on ‘settled’ Travellers, but these supposedly assimilated Travellers still ‘travel’ through private, association and local authority housing stocks, often moving between or within cities up to five or six times a year. Many Travellers are now seasonally nomadic, preferring to Power ● Irish Travellers: Ethnicity, racism and pre-sentence reports 255 winter in housing while risking the vagaries of travelling for work during the summer months (Irish Traveller, Voluntary Support Groups [VSGs] and Traveller Education Services [TESs] interviews, cited in Power, forthcoming 2003). Large disparities in population estimates are partly explained by high internal mobility rates, but also by the (largely unresearched) phenomenon of Irish Traveller seasonal migration between Britain, Ireland and continental Europe. Since the CJPOA 1994 removed the statutory duty on local authorities to provide sites, very few new sites are being built to compensate for site closures and Traveller population growth.2 Population estimates for Travellers and Gypsies in the United Kingdom range between 90,000 and 120,000 (Niner, 2002, p. 10). The age profile of Irish Travellers is exceptionally young: they tend to marry early and families average eight children, so the population is growing quickly (Niner, 2002, pp. 9–10). Irish Travellers form a large proportion of the nomadic and seminomadic Traveller population in Britain. Recent research estimates that about 15,000 nomadic Irish Travellers live in Britain (BIAS, 1997, p. 9). Again this estimate does not include ‘housed’ Travellers – often assumed to be assimilated. All Irish Travellers interviewed on the ‘Room to Roam’ project (and living in settled accommodation) between January 2001 and the Census in June 2001 indicated that they did not intend to return the census form. This reaction was due mainly to their distrust of all official information gathering exercises. Irish Travellers are often institutionally and spatially invisible as a distinct ethnic community in Britain, relegated to ‘defiled’ and neglected inner city or urban peripheral areas whether sited or housed (Sibley, 1995, pp. 72–88). The twisted irony for Irish Travellers is that while they have been an officially recognized ethnic group since August 2000 in England and Wales (O’Leary vs Allied Domecq cited in Discrimination Law Association, 2002, p. 10) for the purposes of the Race Relations Act 1976 and the Race Relations Amendment Act 2001, their nomadism is still criminalized. Welfare considerations On the limited permanent site provision available in Britain, Travellers pay rent and council tax, but often receive little culturally sensitive local authority welfare support. Lack of knowledge of bureaucratic systems, extremely high illiteracy rates, and difficulties with ‘settled’ timeframes impede access to services. They are excluded from the tenure provisions of the Mobile Homes Act 1983, depending instead on a licence system that provides virtually no security. Travellers also complain that they cannot get home and/or contents insurance because they live on ‘permanent’ sites. The current restrictions on the availability of appropriate accommodation has led to chronic overcrowding, and resultant disputes on sites within and between Traveller families that can result in ‘fire brigade’ policing, confrontation and arrests (see Power, forthcoming 2003). Travellers suffer poorer health and lower life expectancy than is the norm in the settled community throughout Britain (Niner, 2002, p. 10). Research in Ireland (cited on Pavee Point website, 1998) illustrates the wide gulf between Travellers’ health and that of settled people: 256 Probation Journal 50(3) Because Irish Travellers are a distinct ethnic group, with many members living in intolerable circumstances, they have different and significantly worse health and disease problems than their settled counterparts. The average life expectancy of a Traveller man is 10 years shorter than a settled man’s. Traveller women live on average 12 years less than their settled peers. . . . Travellers have higher death rates for all causes; their rates are significantly higher for: accidents, metabolic disorders in 0–14 age group, respiratory ailments, congenital problems. An inappropriate education system often fails to appreciate the cultural identity and sensitivities of Irish Travellers. Consequently, they struggle to develop knowledge and skills within mainstream educational and training regimes. Later, this can result in an inability to compete successfully for mainstream employment opportunities. In Ireland only 12 percent of Traveller children manage to progress into secondary school – most then drop out within two years (Pavee Point website, 1998). These extremely high educational attrition rates are replicated in Britain where many young Irish Travellers are temporarily or permanently excluded from schools, thus becoming ‘high risk’ in criminal justice terms (VSGs and TESs interviews). Irish Travellers have raised families on permanent sites for over 30 years, but new generations are now forced to leave these sites and live as outlaws on the road or move into inappropriate conventional housing for the first time. Travellers have tried to ameliorate paltry state accommodation provision by buying their own plots for trailer sites, but are often refused planning permission due to NIMBY (‘not in my back yard’) inspired objections by settled residents as exemplified in the ‘Case of Chapman v. The United Kingdom’ (18 January 2001, Judgement, Application no. 27238/95, ECHR, Strasbourg). The dearth of temporary and permanent sites has had a devastating impact on the primary healthcare, mental health, education, and general welfare of Irish Travellers in Britain. The resulting prevalence of unauthorised camping condemns large numbers of Travellers to harassment from the police and local authorities under the CJPOA 1994 trespass provisions. These pressures have forced many into inadequate settled accommodation, often splitting families and removing Travellers from the social and psychological supports of their extended family. Inappropriate settlement exposes them to discrimination, racism and cultural degradation – particularly true of young Travellers torn between traditional nomadic culture and urban street cultures (Irish Traveller interviews cited in Power forthcoming, 2003). The cumulative effect of these developments is the impoverishment, cultural genocide and criminalization of large sections of the Irish Traveller community in Britain (Collins, 2003). Criminal justice issues Street begging and petty crime by Travellers is a minor problem, but the community as a whole have been routinely labelled as petty criminals and socially undesirable by many powerful definers in society. Morris and Clements (1999, p. 33) state Power ● Irish Travellers: Ethnicity, racism and pre-sentence reports 257 that ‘ACPO [Association of Chief Police Officers] continues to assert that they have no disproportionate problems with criminality in the Travelling populations, and the continuing presumptions stem largely from stereotyping.’ Conflict has arisen between urban settled denizens, local authorities, police forces, and Irish Travellers as urbanisation and economic change have broken down the traditional socioeconomic ties that bound nomadic and settled communities together (McCarthy, 1994, pp. 121–129; Sibley, 1995, pp. 102–112). As a result their traditional nomadic rights (and those of other nomadic groups) in Britain have been severely curtailed by increased commodification of marginal land, and state and society’s growing resistance to their nomadic way of life as evidenced by criminal justice legislation (CJPOA 1994) aimed specifically at criminalising nomadism. As ‘New Age’ Travellers took to the road from the middle 1980s onwards, the Conservative government reacted by passing the CJPOA 1994. The Act has virtually outlawed the traditional nomadic lifestyle of Irish Travellers. Unauthorised halting on traditionally used marginal land and roadside verges has been criminalised, and this Act also removed the duty on local authorities to provide permanent trailer sites while ending DETR statutory grants for local authorities to build permanent sites. ‘Part Five’ of the CJPOA also extended powers contained in the Public Order Act 1986 (Section 39), giving the police draconian powers to direct trespassers to leave if they have damaged the land itself (as distinct from property on it), or if they have six or more vehicles. It also extended the application of this ‘Section’ to common land, highway verges, byways, green lanes and other minor highways, and included new police powers to remove vehicles without recourse to any law court (Clements and Morris, 2001, p. 10). A 1994 probation study by Stanton (cited in Fletcher et al., February 1997, p. 16) in Newark highlighted Irish Travellers’ over-representation in the criminal justice system. The research concluded that the police targeted Travellers particularly for vehicle related (mostly minor) offences. As a result Irish Travellers were often held overnight so the police could request that magistrates impose bail conditions for alleged road traffic offences (not usual practice). Consequently Travellers struggled to claim unconditional bail and were more likely to be remanded into custody. Disqualification from driving also heightened the probability of further charges and resultant imprisonment (see also Traveller interviews in Power, forthcoming 2003). Research carried out over one year by the Association of Chief Officers of Probation (ACOP – now defunct in the reorganised National Probation Service) and the National Association for the Care and Resettlement of Offenders (NACRO – now ‘NACRO – The Crime Reduction Charity’) and published in 1993 (cited in Fletcher et al., 1997, p. 17) found that significant numbers of young ‘Travellers’ were remanded into custody from courts in the London region to Feltham Young Offenders Institution. Fletcher et al. (1997, p. 18) comment on this research: They found that a significant number of young people were identified as Travellers. This group of young people accounted for 38% of admissions of all young people classified as white from these courts. This abnormally high figure reflects prejudice at court about the mobility and therefore risk of absconsion [sic] of Travellers. 258 Probation Journal 50(3) Irish Travellers are not as yet ethnically monitored within the criminal justice system, so this percentage stands in shocking isolation. The Commission for Racial Equality (2002, p. 3) recommendations on ethnic monitoring state that: To have an equality policy without ethnic monitoring is like aiming for good financial management without keeping financial records. . . . Ethnic monitoring can tell you whether you are offering equality of opportunity and treatment to all ethnic groups. It can also tell you how and why you are falling short of this ideal. Unfortunately the same document (p. 10) suggests the 2001 census categories as a good guide to which ethnic groups to monitor – though Irish Travellers were not included as a distinct category. This lack of recognition for Travellers by central institutions of the state permeates throughout the institutional matrix of the criminal justice system. Irish Travellers are often construed as a ‘criminal community’ rather than an ethnic minority – victims again of simplistic ideas about the black/white binary of ethnicity/race and sedentary prejudice about nomadism. The following section examines the centrality of PSRs in the sentencing process and how the ethnocentric construction of PSRs on black offenders was challenged by Denney (1992) and others. It then examines how some PSRs on Irish Travellers in GMPA have been shown to be discriminatory and racist. PSRs and perceptions of Irish Travellers Greater Manchester has a large but generally ‘invisible’ Irish Traveller population. Manchester’s periphery has a number of authorized sites, but the city itself has only one small local authority site. So the vast majority of Irish Travellers live in settled-type accommodation such as houses, flats and hostels – though many move regularly through the housing system and some migrate occasionally to other British cities or to Ireland, while others are seasonally nomadic (interviews with Irish Travellers, VSGs and TESs). Little research to date has been conducted specifically relating to Irish Travellers in Britain’s criminal justice system, but data from research carried out on the overall Irish community in Britain and Travellers and Gypsies generally can cast some light on particular anti-Irish Traveller institutional and direct racism. Denney’s (1992) study of ‘language use’ in probation practice illustrated how subjective judgements made by probation officers were often afforded undue validity in criminal justice sentencing processes, demonstrating how officers’ assumptions and perceptions about black people could contribute to prejudicial judgments through courtroom verbal submissions and written PSRs. This section will use existing data and new material from the ‘Room to Roam’ project to highlight discrimination against Travellers in the probation process by examining the use of language and the representation of Irish Travellers and nomadism in PSRs. PSRs have a profound impact on sentencing practice, and there is also an increasing awareness that differential treatment of minority ethnic groups occurs routinely within criminal justice processes (Denney, 1992; Bhui, 1999). This has led – particularly in the wake of the Macpherson investigation into police racism Power ● Irish Travellers: Ethnicity, racism and pre-sentence reports 259 and the duty imposed by the RRAA (2001: appendices 3, 5) on public authorities to promote equal opportunities, good race relations and eliminate unlawful discrimination – to an examination of institutional racism in all major state institutions. It is also leading to the establishment of formalized bureaucratic quality control systems in national organizations like the probation service (Macpherson, 1999, para. 46.25). In the case of PSRs these controls involve the scrutiny and discussion of reports prior to their submission so that all content and sentencing proposals are compliant with anti-discriminatory practice. These safeguards are now applied in some areas to black and female defendants, but not to white ethnic minorities like the settled Irish population (the largest minority ethnic group in Britain) or nomadic groups like Irish Travellers, despite published research and much anecdotal evidence that indicates considerable discrimination against these groups in the criminal justice system (Murphy, 1994; Fletcher et al., 1997; Devereaux, 1999; Power, forthcoming 2003). Devereaux’s (1999) detailed study of PSRs conducted on Irish people in the Greater Manchester area concluded that: Irish defendants are more likely to receive custodial sentences than any other group even when they have committed the lowest rate of more serious offences. (p. 77) Previously published research by Murphy (1994), who examined 91 PSRs on Irish male and female defendants in Nottingham, and Fletcher et al. (1997), support Devereaux’s (1999) findings that Irish defendants generally are more likely to face incarceration than any of the other major ethnic groups in Britain. Devereaux (1999, p. 80) examined 35 PSRs on Irish people, finding that 29 contained information considered irrelevant, while 27 ‘were judged likely to be harmful to the individual and to trigger prejudice’ (p. 80). Devereaux continues: The critical question concerning the relevance of information is the impact its presence or absence has on triggering prejudice. If part of the role of the presentence report writer is to present information and make a sentence proposal in an anti-discriminatory fashion, then they should consider the impact of information and take that into account. (p. 80) The most disturbing aspect from an Irish Traveller perspective was the particular negativity with which information or even suspicion of nomadism or transience was treated in some of the PSRs examined. Similar findings were highlighted in Pizani Williams’ (1998) study of Gypsies and Travellers in Kent magistrate’s courts. Twenty percent of the Manchester PSRs introduced nationality and place of birth with no obvious relevance to the particular case. In some PSRs these references were coupled with non affirmative comments on the transient nature of the particular subject such as: ‘. . . moved back to Birmingham and has lived in Birmingham and Galway intermittently during the last 4 years . . . lived in various hostels . . .’ (cited in Devereaux, 1999, p. 82). Another PSR involved a reluctance to sanction a referral to a community service team ‘until the defendant has an address to go to’ (ibid, p. 83). Uncorroborated hearsay could be the basis for sentencing as in this extract from a PSR where the probation officer did not recommend transferring 260 Probation Journal 50(3) a community based order to the south west, but asserted that the defendant ‘had indicated to staff at the bail hostel that he was considering travelling to the south west for the summer’ (ibid). So to be Irish, have nomadic or transient tendencies, or to be presumed to have these predilections was construed negatively by PSR writers in the latter cases. Devereaux (1999, p. 88) also found in her Manchester case studies that ‘the recommendations in court reports bear least resemblance to the eventual sentence for this [Irish] group’, and asserted that GMPA have a case to answer in relation to Irish defendants and ‘institutional racism’ as defined in the Macpherson Report (1999). Research interviews with probation staff in Manchester provide support for Devereaux’s findings. Two experienced female officers with 29 years combined probation experience, discussed anti-Traveller racism and discrimination in the GMPA generally and around PSRs specifically, adding more experiential and qualitative weight to Devereaux’s findings: I’ve seen people’s background [Irish Travellers] referred to in such a way that it is clear that it is derisory and . . . we’re upping the ante really in terms of risk. And I have to say I never actually felt satisfied with the responses that I got. I mean people for example who have lived in settled addresses for ten years and their [nomadic] origins were being discussed – well I mean there was no need to whatsoever. You would definitely get a lot of people [Travellers] serving short custodial sentences where really they should have had a community sentence, but because of the [perceived] lifestyle dangers they would [not] be considered in the first place, [or] they wouldn’t have done very well on [probation] previously. I was really concerned that . . . someone from my team . . . was writing a [PSR] report in a way which was very markedly bringing out the fact that someone was a Traveller . . . If you read the report you would know the hidden message that this person is a Traveller and that they’re a bit dodgy. So given that attitude to the young [Irish Traveller] people – its obvious that they are going to accumulate really hefty criminal records within a very short space of time. So by the time they hit the adult scene they will have [a very poor record]. . . . I took that [PSR] report to a manager and I didn’t get any decent response actually . . . Irish Travellers themselves rarely understand probation and criminal justice processes in general and the particular importance of PSRs to the sentences they receive (Irish Traveller prisoner interviews). The Race Relations Liaison Officer at one of the research prisons commented on this lack of bureaucratic and institutional nous among Travellers: I have realised that a lot of the Traveller lads come in and . . . are acting very street-wise . . . I think that’s very important that . . . you realise that they don’t actually understand the sentence, the court, the magistrates court, they don’t understand the judicial procedure generally, they don’t understand the prison remand and allocation procedure. Power ● Irish Travellers: Ethnicity, racism and pre-sentence reports 261 One of the GMPA officers discussed the racism and prejudice directed at Irish Travellers living mainly in ‘settled’ accommodation in Manchester: . . . if you speak to colleagues about it they will acknowledge that they do struggle with Travellers. They struggle to know how to approach them, about how they’re suspicious of them. They don’t know how to get over that barrier. There has been little detailed research on Irish Travellers and other culturally nomadic groups in the criminal justice system, but that which does exist underlines the need for more concentrated work in this area. PSRs are a particularly good way to analyse and determine degrees of prejudice in the probation process and are crucial in determining the custodial fate or otherwise of offenders. Devereaux’s (1999) work on PSRs on offenders claiming Irish ethnicity underlines not only the inclusion of much spurious information that could obfuscate clear understanding of an offender’s circumstances and motivations, but an extremely high incidence of potentially harmful and prejudicial content. Many of the examples quoted above from Devereaux allude to Irish people with transient or nomadic ‘tendencies’ and those with no fixed abode in GMPA without specifying Travellers. This evidence is corroborated and reinforced by the experiential and detailed examples of prejudice and racism against Irish Travellers alluded to by the two Manchester probation officers generally and in the construction of PSRs specifically. They explain how PSRs with a particular prejudice against nomadism lead to short custodial sentences for Travellers that can spiral into accelerated criminalization over a short time as repeated custodial sentences reinforce the presumed criminality of Travellers within elements of the GMPA and elsewhere. Bridging the difficulties indicated by the Race Relations Liaison Officer and the GMPA officers in communication and understanding between Travellers and criminal justice operatives is central to dealing with anti-Traveller prejudice and racism in the criminal justice system. Bhui (1999, p.173) states that PSR writers should understand and recognize the importance of structural factors in offending behaviour ‘such as unemployment, poor housing, racism and discrimination.’ But nomadism (rather than transience) and the criminalization of nomadism are barely recognised structural factors, though they underpin much of the negative stereotyping applied to Travellers: [I]nstead of looking at people in terms of the individual problems, they have been looked at [as a population] just as problems . . . there are strong notions [prejudices] around that even these people [Travellers] carry with them . . . that they are violent, that they will be very heavy binge drinkers, that they will be particularly into domestic violence and that the women just put up with it because they think it is part of the culture. They’ll have kids who will become very unruly and unmanageable teenagers . . . they’re into car crime . . . they are seen as just representative of all those things [stereotypes] just lumped together. (GMPA probation officer) One Irish Traveller ‘wintering’ in housing with his family in one of the above ‘sink’ areas suggested humorously that his family were a good example to other residents 262 Probation Journal 50(3) in that they were a loving, cohesive family and good neighbours – perfect communitarians. The two Manchester probation officers discussed the crucial issue of confused and contradictory understandings of what accommodation and economy means to Irish Travellers (whether in trailers or housing) on the one hand, and probation policy and practice (the importance of a fixed abode and a sedentary attitude in PSR recommendations) on the other, resulting in the reinforcement of distrust and ignorance on both sides: [Accommodation] issues when dealing with nomadic people is a problem for us [probation service], it’s an issue. If somebody is not in settled accommodation it immediately ups their risk. . . . [T]hey tend to be doing a lot of things really but . . . they can’t verify; that’s a big issue, verification in terms of what their employment is, what they’re doing, how they’re occupied . . . if they’ve got any illness . . . Travellers, certainly in my experience and working with them in the probation service, . . . they’re suspicious . . . they are hard to engage with and I understand why. . . . When I first started in probation . . . I naively thought that because I was Irish they [Travellers] would treat me differently from the English. . . . And what it means is that the [probation] services have to go to the sites, that they probably have to relocate. You know, it’s not good enough just being in a nice building somewhere. A Youth Offending Team (YOT) manager in Manchester describes how he dealt in a culturally sensitive manner with one Irish Traveller offender in relation to community sentence programmes, the agency’s own geographical specificity, and nomadism: The sanctions [on Irish Travellers] will be exactly the same as for any other child. . . . We apply national standards . . . . Now the sorts of things that I would be saying to an officer for them not to take a kid back to court, is . . . give me the reasons, give me the evidence, why you shouldn’t do it. . . . We did have . . . this girl now and one of the issues with her was that national standards couldn’t be applied, because she couldn’t report twice a week because she was literally travelling the country. So what we said was ‘right when you know where you are gonna be, we will have a programme.’ . . . [Y]our local Youth Offending Team where you are is this one, we will arrange for you to go in and see them, and as long as (and this is the deal) you stay out of trouble and there [are] no reports of any problems, and you report to them – rather than it being twice a week it’s once a week. . . . [A]nd at one point we felt that she might have been wobbling a touch. So we made her come back to Manchester . . . . There was a meeting with the officer and her mum and dad, and then we were basically saying that we are being flexible, don’t mess us about. And everything after that was fine. And I think we also did take it back to court at the nearest possible point for her to get the order revoked on the grounds of good progress . . . but also we have to say that we did tell the court there were some logistical problems here. And they [the court] accepted that. . . . She had behaved herself and there were glowing reports, and I think the logistical issue of Power ● Irish Travellers: Ethnicity, racism and pre-sentence reports 263 her being from a Travelling family, if there was any doubt in the magistrate’s mind, I am sure that would have swayed it in her favour. In this YOT case the application of locally administered discretion based on a working knowledge of Irish Traveller culture and nomadism led to a good noncustodial result for all concerned. Good practice brought a number of YOT areas, the magistrates court, the offender and her nomadic Traveller family to an enhanced degree of understanding and co-operation on all sides. Thinking and acting ‘outside the box’ but within regulations enabled the YOT to prevent a custodial sentence for the young Traveller woman offender and impressed on all involved that a nomadic lifestyle did not preclude a non-custodial sentence. A family of Irish Travellers themselves experienced positive engagement, communication and respect from a number of criminal justice agents and reciprocated in kind. The kind of discriminatory and racist assumptions highlighted in Devereaux’s (1999) work on PSRs could be challenged and ameliorated to some extent in the GMPA though the average caseload of probation officers is much larger than that of YOT teams. Improved ethnic monitoring, more team-work and informed advice and input from external experts into PSRs may be a constructive way forward. Conclusions and ways forward In terms of equality of assessment in the National Probation Service (NPS) there are some positive signs, though progress will not be straightforward. One of the GMPA officers commented on OASys: The moves are away I have to say from discretion. . . . I mean we are moving on to this tool now . . . called OASys, and you know what’s good about it is that you can actually see why you are asking questions – you can see what they are trying to get at so subjectivity will be able to be measured [with] a bit more certainty than in the past. Okay there will still be issues around those particular questions that you’re asking in the first place but it will be national and it will be available for scrutiny and it actually should assist research much better in terms of what we should be about. . . . I haven’t actually been thinking about Traveller families whenever I’ve been [studying OASys], but I will make sure that forms a part of my thought process. So positive awareness of nomadism and an informed working knowledge about the various indigenous nomadic groups is crucial if the NPS wishes to dispense real justice to nomadic ethnic groups like Irish Travellers. But the use of informed discretion and intuition, and the authorisation to depart from set procedures to work ‘outside the box’, is central to the delivery of a fair and balanced service to nomadic groups, as exemplified in the YOT example cited above. Political action both within and beyond the NPS is necessary to challenge the negative stereotypes of Irish Travellers. Both these probation officers are active members of the Irish Probation Forum in Manchester (IPFM) made up of probation practitioners at all levels in the GMPA concerned about racism and discrimination against both settled Irish and Irish Travellers in the criminal justice system: 264 Probation Journal 50(3) This group [Irish Travellers] has not been included in terms of any specialist provision . . . . Probation have actually been quite supportive in Manchester about the Irish and Travellers . . . . And I think that a lot has changed, although there are still an awful lot of people on the ground working in this service [who] have this notion that equality is treating everybody the same. And if you set up a good service to meet a special need they see that as a step too far. . . . One of the big problems though is that for a long time . . . people haven’t talked. There’s been no discussion. [W]hen I first came to probation . . . anti-racism training . . . was very high on the agenda and some of it wasn’t handled very well. And what happened was that people really got set back and they felt that they couldn’t challenge. . . . The particular [probation] area that I moved to had a very stagnant group of [probation] staff, a very long serving staff. . . . The majority of staff were middle class, very white and very English. (GMPA probation officer) So, though senior probation personnel are generally supportive around equality issues, there are pockets of resistance to change among practitioners at the crucial interface between the public and the probation service. Improved training and awareness raising generally on Irish related issues, and specifically about Irish Travellers, is essential to the delivery of a fair and effective service. The simplistic black/white binary that underpins much of the discourse and understanding about race and ethnicity should be challenged, so highlighting discrimination and ‘invisible’ racism against minority white ethnic groups like Irish Travellers (Fenton, 1999). Probation officers who are positively aware of Irish Traveller issues face moral and ethical dilemmas when writing PSRs due to the lack of recognition and monitoring of Irish Travellers in GMPA and the criminal justice system generally. The following quotation shows that discretion can be used in PSRs to counteract the prejudice and ignorance of the courts: I see that there is a fine balance now between mentioning things which you know just from your experience [that] the courts will react to badly and in those instances my instinct has always been . . . I’m not going to make a situation worse for somebody because of x, y, or z. But I also believe really that until the service gets its act together in terms of considering this group [Irish Travellers] . . . it’s almost wrong to acknowledge things unless you’ve got a solution. (GMPA probation officer) But culturally sensitive risk assessment depends on knowledge and understanding of the subject and their background. Irish Travellers will sometimes disguise their ethnicity when confronted by officials, and stressed probation officers occasionally fail to ask (or don’t know how to ask) the question, or decide themselves as to the subject’s ethnicity (Devereaux, 1999, p. 101; Power, forthcoming 2003). So how often are discriminatory PSRs written by busy officers whose ‘knowledge and competence is challenged’ during risk assessments, and whose intuition in these circumstances may default to embedded assumptions and prejudices about Irish Travellers (Bhui, 1999, p. 179)? In most areas, PSRs on black people and women now attract automatic scrutiny and discussion prior to their submission so that all content and sentencing Power ● Irish Travellers: Ethnicity, racism and pre-sentence reports 265 proposals are compliant with anti-discriminatory practice. Denney’s (1992) systematic examination of the complex relationships between probation officers’ perceptions of offending, probation practice, and the multiple meanings that inform probation intervention with black offenders should to be adapted and applied to marginalised ethnic groups like Irish Travellers. In GMPA AfroCaribbean and Asian VSGs with specialist background knowledge assist probation officers with the writing of PSRs (IPFM meeting cited in Power, forthcoming 2003). The NPS should develop a similar system so that ‘partnership’ groups with expertise in working with Irish Travellers (and other nomadic groups) are co-opted to advise on PSR background and content.3 In other probation-related areas like parole or home detention curfew, a fixed abode is regarded as extremely important for eligibility. This sedentary approach should be modified and advice and guidance sought from VSGs with Irish Traveller expertise as to suitability. The need for comprehensive monitoring of Irish Travellers by the NPS is acute and more research is needed into their experiences in the criminal justice system generally. Notes 1 These figures include all indigenous nomadic groups and are not specific to Irish Travellers. 2 Local Authority sites lost a total of 234 trailer pitches in Britain from 1998–1999. 3 ‘Partnership’ in this context refers to VSGs based on settled/Traveller co-operation and which include Traveller representatives where possible and appropriate. References Adams, B., Okely, J., Morgan, D. and Smith, D. (1975) Gypsies and Government Policies in England. A Study of the Travellers’ Way of Life in Relation to the Policies and Practices of Central and Local Government. London: Heinemann. Bhui, H.S. (1999) ‘Race, Racism and Risk Assessment: Linking Theory to Practice with Black Mentally Disordered Offenders’, in Probation Journal 46 (3), pp. 171–181. BIAS (1997) Health Access Project. NHS Ethnic Health Unit. Clements, L. and Morris, R. (2001) Disability, Social Care, Health and Travelling People. Cardiff: University Press. Collins, M. (2003) ‘Untitled’ conference paper, presented at ‘Irish Travellers: Sited, Settled, Nomadic’ conference. Manchester: Irish World Heritage Centre. Commission for Racial Equality (2002) Ethnic Monitoring. A Guide for Public Authorities (non-statutory). London: CRE. Denney, D. (1992) Racism and Anti-racism in Probation. London: Routledge. Devereaux, D. (1999) Enforced Invisibility: The Irish Experience of the Criminal Justice System. Unpublished MA thesis submitted to the School of Law, Manchester Metropolitan University. Discrimination Law Association (2002) Briefings, February, Volume 15. Fenton, S. (1999) Ethnicity, Racism, Class and Culture. Basingstoke and London: Macmillan Press. Fletcher, H., Hutton, S., McCarthy, B., McFlynn, J. and Mitchell, H. (1997) The Irish Community: Discrimination and the Criminal Justice System. London: National Association of Probation Officers, Federation of Irish Societies, Action Group for Irish Youth, Irish Commission for Prisoners Overseas, and The Bourne Trust. 266 Probation Journal 50(3) Hickman, M. and Walter, B. (1997) Discrimination and the Irish Community in Britain. London: CRE. Macpherson, W. (1999) The Stephen Lawrence Inquiry, Cm 4262. London: Stationery Office. McCann, M., Ó Síocháin, S. and Ruane, J. (eds) (1994) Irish Travellers: Culture and Ethnicity. Belfast: Queen’s University. McCarthy, P (1994) ‘The Sub-Culture of Poverty Reconsidered’, in M. McCann et al., . Irish Travellers: Culture and Ethnicity. Belfast: Queen’s University. Morris, R. and Clements, L. (eds) (1999). Gaining Ground: Law Reform for Gypsies and Travellers. Hatfield: University of Hertfordshire Press. Murphy, P. (1994) ‘The Invisible Minority: Irish Offenders and the English Criminal Justice System’, in Probation Journal 41 (1), pp. 2–7. NACRO/ACOP (1995) A Crisis in Custody – A Survey of Juveniles Remanded into Custody Awaiting Trial. London: Association of Chief Officers of Probation and the National Association for the Care and Resettlement of Offenders. Niner, P (2002) The Provision and Condition of Local Authority Gypsy/Traveller Sites . in England. A Report to Office of the Deputy Prime Minister on a Programme of Research. Centre for Urban and Regional Studies, University of Birmingham and Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, London. ODPM (2001) ‘Gypsy/Traveller Counts’ www.housing.odpm.gov.uk/information/ index14.htm, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister. Pavee Point (1998) http: //ireland.iol.ie/~pavee/ Internet information website. Pizani Williams, L. (1998) Gypsies and Travellers in the Criminal Justice System: The Forgotten Minority? Cambridge: University of Cambridge Institute of Criminology. Power, C. (forthcoming 2003) Room to Roam: Britain’s Irish Travellers (provisional title). London: Community Fund. Sibley, D. (1995) Geographies of Exclusion – Societies and Difference in the West. London: Routledge. Stanton, A.K. (1994) An Impressionistic Account of the Discrimination Suffered by White Ethnic Minorities in Newark, unpublished paper, cited in H. Fletcher et al., 1997, The Irish Community: Discrimination and the Criminal Justice System. London: National Association of Probation Officers, Federation of Irish Societies, Action Group for Irish Youth, Irish Commission for Prisoners Overseas, and The Bourne Trust. Dr. Colm Power is Principal Researcher on ‘Room to Roam: Britain’s Irish Travellers’ a research project on Irish Travellers based at St. Mary’s College, Strawberry Hill (part of a consortium including Action Group for Irish Youth and BIAS Irish Travellers Project), funded by the Community Fund and due for publication in October 2003. Contact address: St. Mary’s College, Strawberry Hill, Twickenham, Surrey, TW1 4SX. Email: powerc@smuc.ac.uk